Altmer or Dunmer. Which culture is more "advanced"?

scipionumatia

Their education systems are supposed to be the best there is, granted there is not an elder scrolls game where you get to enroll in an altmer university so we dont know much of what they would study. I can say though that literacy is common in the elder scrolls universe, even for those who dont have any kind of formal education so i wouldnt use that as a gold standard. Also its very common for present civilizations to occupy and utilize items from the deceased technologically superior predecessors. Its a running theme you can find in every elder scrolls game. The altmer utilize the aldmer tech the same way the dwemer utilize chimer and dwarven tech.
I think my main point is still valid- The altmer are very organized and operate to bolster their race, they seek knowledge and education. The dunmer are organized among their inner circles and compete against everyone who is considered an outsider, including rival dunmer organizations. They seek power. Not one is superior to the other unless you take into consideration the cultural target theyre trying to achieve. The altmer as a race have a relative common goal, while the dunmer are continuously fighting among themselves to determine what that goal should be.
Also i thought we were just comparing altmer to dunmer, not altmer vs everyone. If we are taking all races into account for which is the most superior id have to say the imperials take the cake.

All this talk of the dunmers wants me to make one, in all the elder scrolls games ive ever played ive not once made a dunmer character. Ive made altmers but that was cause the racial passive was the most flexible for damage. with dunmer your kinda pointed in the fire direction and whenever i make a mag dk i end up going argonian. I played skyrim through as an bosmer the first time, and an orc the second time. morrowind i played through as a breton. and in eso ive never made one, i really should, just dont know what class to make, mag dk seems the only fitting one tbh. maybe magblade.

psychotrip

scipionumatia wrote: »

Their education systems are supposed to be the best there is, granted there is not an elder scrolls game where you get to enroll in an altmer university so we dont know much of what they would study. I can say though that literacy is common in the elder scrolls universe, even for those who dont have any kind of formal education so i wouldnt use that as a gold standard. Also its very common for present civilizations to occupy and utilize items from the deceased technologically superior predecessors. Its a running theme you can find in every elder scrolls game. The altmer utilize the aldmer tech the same way the dwemer utilize chimer and dwarven tech.
I think my main point is still valid- The altmer are very organized and operate to bolster their race, they seek knowledge and education. The dunmer are organized among their inner circles and compete against everyone who is considered an outsider, including rival dunmer organizations. They seek power. Not one is superior to the other unless you take into consideration the cultural target theyre trying to achieve. The altmer as a race have a relative common goal, while the dunmer are continuously fighting among themselves to determine what that goal should be.
Also i thought we were just comparing altmer to dunmer, not altmer vs everyone. If we are taking all races into account for which is the most superior id have to say the imperials take the cake.

All this talk of the dunmers wants me to make one, in all the elder scrolls games ive ever played ive not once made a dunmer character. Ive made altmers but that was cause the racial passive was the most flexible for damage. with dunmer your kinda pointed in the fire direction and whenever i make a mag dk i end up going argonian. I played skyrim through as an bosmer the first time, and an orc the second time. morrowind i played through as a breton. and in eso ive never made one, i really should, just dont know what class to make, mag dk seems the only fitting one tbh. maybe magblade.

So the thing you claim makes the altmer advanced is something we never get to see or interact with...that’s pretty typical of the elder scrolls at this point I guess.

Yes races can live off their past, but the Altmer seem to have nothing of their own, not even mass-producable recreations or refinements of ancient technology. They’re just medieval europeans while the dunmer have modern engineering and magical cloning. Even the nords had ruins with mechanized parts thousands of years ago.

In their attempt to make the altmer feel “grounded”, Zenimax made them more primitive than half of Tamriel.

VaranisArano

psychotrip wrote: »

scipionumatia wrote: »

Their education systems are supposed to be the best there is, granted there is not an elder scrolls game where you get to enroll in an altmer university so we dont know much of what they would study. I can say though that literacy is common in the elder scrolls universe, even for those who dont have any kind of formal education so i wouldnt use that as a gold standard. Also its very common for present civilizations to occupy and utilize items from the deceased technologically superior predecessors. Its a running theme you can find in every elder scrolls game. The altmer utilize the aldmer tech the same way the dwemer utilize chimer and dwarven tech.
I think my main point is still valid- The altmer are very organized and operate to bolster their race, they seek knowledge and education. The dunmer are organized among their inner circles and compete against everyone who is considered an outsider, including rival dunmer organizations. They seek power. Not one is superior to the other unless you take into consideration the cultural target theyre trying to achieve. The altmer as a race have a relative common goal, while the dunmer are continuously fighting among themselves to determine what that goal should be.
Also i thought we were just comparing altmer to dunmer, not altmer vs everyone. If we are taking all races into account for which is the most superior id have to say the imperials take the cake.

All this talk of the dunmers wants me to make one, in all the elder scrolls games ive ever played ive not once made a dunmer character. Ive made altmers but that was cause the racial passive was the most flexible for damage. with dunmer your kinda pointed in the fire direction and whenever i make a mag dk i end up going argonian. I played skyrim through as an bosmer the first time, and an orc the second time. morrowind i played through as a breton. and in eso ive never made one, i really should, just dont know what class to make, mag dk seems the only fitting one tbh. maybe magblade.

So the thing you claim makes the altmer advanced is something we never get to see or interact with...that’s pretty typical of the elder scrolls at this point I guess.

Yes races can live off their past, but the Altmer seem to have nothing of their own, not even mass-producable recreations or refinements of ancient technology. They’re just medieval europeans while the dunmer have modern engineering and magical cloning. Even the nords had ruins with mechanized parts thousands of years ago.

In their attempt to make the altmer feel “grounded”, Zenimax made them more primitive than half of Tamriel.

You say they're "just medieval europeans" like building cathedrals isn't an amazing feat of engineering.

The Altmer have entire cities built like that. Flying buttresses and all. Oh, and they've got sewer systems too, we get to see Shimmerene's. We're not talking Breton cities with a few stone buildings like the castle and the guilds while everyone else just builds inside the city walls and a glorified cave system for a sewer like Wayrest. We're talking whole cities, planned out to make full use of vertical space, and beautiful in the style of Mont St. Michel or Neuschwanstein. Mournhold and Vivec's sewer might power fountains, but Shimmerene's is no slouch in the "hey, people live down here and its not completely filthy" department.

The Altmer can produce large panes of clear glass, as we see in their greenhouses. Its not modern glass, sure, but its pretty hard to make uniform clear panes of glass to the extent the Altmer do.This also indicates a rather high degree of agricultural knowledge since they use greenhouses. The Dunmer focus on fungi, obviously, since Vvardenfell's got a lot of that. The Altmer don't have anything as showy as mushroom houses, but frankly, they've got a very tolerable climate and enough stoneworkers to build awesome cities, so why would they bother?

From what we can tell of their schooling, they use magic more intensively and school more of their populaiton than we've seen previously. As far as I can tell, the Dunmer seem to work on a master/apprentice system where you get a mentor for a task from your house and you learn from that person. At least, that's how outlanders like our Nerevarine get taught how to do things. The Altmer seem to emphasize self-learning (the path to Alaxon as you seek perfection in your vocation), mentorship (highly competitive with artists and the actors in the House of Revelries) and academies like Illumination Academy and the College of Sapiarchs. Illumination Academy has an extremely magical library that betters anything we've seen in the Arcane University, College of Winterhold, or a Telvanni Magelord. The College of Sapiarchs, while we don't see a whole lot of their work, does carry out experiments (I don't recall exactly, but I want to say the Sapiarchs are montioring the crab eggs of the Queen of the Reef WB to figure out corruption levels, or something like that), and they work together as colleagues in their different disciplines. Did I mention they work together? That's huge, because the Telvanni Magelords don't and the other magical colleges tend to squabble over politics. The Telvanni are hugely competitive as well, but since they tend towards klingon promotions and dog-eat-dog, the Telvanni Magelords end up being the stand-out-above-the-rest-outliers like Neloth and Divayth Fyr. Whereas the Sapiarchs as a whole have a much greater body of knowledge and successfully protected the Crystal Tower and Summerset from the Sea Sloads for over 300 years (They weren't expecting

Ritemaster Iachesis to be mind magicked into stealing the heart of their defenses, or to be attacked by Leythen's daedra, or for Nocturnal to show up and slaughter most of them in the Crystal Tower at the time.

)

Though if you are going to bring up Divayth Fyr's magical cloning, I'm going to bring up Mannimarco pioneering necromancy and inventing lichhood. I'm hard pressed to find a Dunmer who made as big an impact on Tamriel as a whole as Vanus Galerion did by starting his mages guild to bring magic and magical education to the masses of Tamriel. Vivec isn't the only person who can plan a city. Mournhold and Vivec, meet Shimmerene and Alinor. Different cities, to be sure, but all planned out and built as excellent examples of their architectural styles (and the Altmer built theirs without infusions of divine blessings from Vivec).

Personally, I don't think the Altmer feel primitive. They feel - less than they could have been, thanks to ZOS - like very high end medieval fantasy. To use a Lord of the Rings analogy, they feel like Gondor or the Numenorians, with shades of Rivendell. Which is a little disappointing, since I think many of us were hoping for something closer to the experience we had in TES III where we were immersed in an alien, utterly weird culture, only this time with more magic.

Now, I will be blunt. If you are determined to say that the Dunmer are better, I'm not going to convince you. Its a little hard to do that when you've got all of the rich detail of TES III to argue from on top of ESO, and I've got 1 zone and 1 Chapter and devs who want to retcon half the existing lore. But please, don't overlook the accomplishments the Altmer actually do have or pretend that they are somehow more 'primitive" than what we've seen from the other races in Tamriel.

psychotrip

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

scipionumatia wrote: »

Their education systems are supposed to be the best there is, granted there is not an elder scrolls game where you get to enroll in an altmer university so we dont know much of what they would study. I can say though that literacy is common in the elder scrolls universe, even for those who dont have any kind of formal education so i wouldnt use that as a gold standard. Also its very common for present civilizations to occupy and utilize items from the deceased technologically superior predecessors. Its a running theme you can find in every elder scrolls game. The altmer utilize the aldmer tech the same way the dwemer utilize chimer and dwarven tech.
I think my main point is still valid- The altmer are very organized and operate to bolster their race, they seek knowledge and education. The dunmer are organized among their inner circles and compete against everyone who is considered an outsider, including rival dunmer organizations. They seek power. Not one is superior to the other unless you take into consideration the cultural target theyre trying to achieve. The altmer as a race have a relative common goal, while the dunmer are continuously fighting among themselves to determine what that goal should be.
Also i thought we were just comparing altmer to dunmer, not altmer vs everyone. If we are taking all races into account for which is the most superior id have to say the imperials take the cake.

All this talk of the dunmers wants me to make one, in all the elder scrolls games ive ever played ive not once made a dunmer character. Ive made altmers but that was cause the racial passive was the most flexible for damage. with dunmer your kinda pointed in the fire direction and whenever i make a mag dk i end up going argonian. I played skyrim through as an bosmer the first time, and an orc the second time. morrowind i played through as a breton. and in eso ive never made one, i really should, just dont know what class to make, mag dk seems the only fitting one tbh. maybe magblade.

So the thing you claim makes the altmer advanced is something we never get to see or interact with...that’s pretty typical of the elder scrolls at this point I guess.

Yes races can live off their past, but the Altmer seem to have nothing of their own, not even mass-producable recreations or refinements of ancient technology. They’re just medieval europeans while the dunmer have modern engineering and magical cloning. Even the nords had ruins with mechanized parts thousands of years ago.

In their attempt to make the altmer feel “grounded”, Zenimax made them more primitive than half of Tamriel.

You say they're "just medieval europeans" like building cathedrals isn't an amazing feat of engineering.

The Altmer have entire cities built like that. Flying buttresses and all. Oh, and they've got sewer systems too, we get to see Shimmerene's. We're not talking Breton cities with a few stone buildings like the castle and the guilds while everyone else just builds inside the city walls and a glorified cave system for a sewer like Wayrest. We're talking whole cities, planned out to make full use of vertical space, and beautiful in the style of Mont St. Michel or Neuschwanstein. Mournhold and Vivec's sewer might power fountains, but Shimmerene's is no slouch in the "hey, people live down here and its not completely filthy" department.

The Altmer can produce large panes of clear glass, as we see in their greenhouses. Its not modern glass, sure, but its pretty hard to make uniform clear panes of glass to the extent the Altmer do.This also indicates a rather high degree of agricultural knowledge since they use greenhouses. The Dunmer focus on fungi, obviously, since Vvardenfell's got a lot of that. The Altmer don't have anything as showy as mushroom houses, but frankly, they've got a very tolerable climate and enough stoneworkers to build awesome cities, so why would they bother?

From what we can tell of their schooling, they use magic more intensively and school more of their populaiton than we've seen previously. As far as I can tell, the Dunmer seem to work on a master/apprentice system where you get a mentor for a task from your house and you learn from that person. At least, that's how outlanders like our Nerevarine get taught how to do things. The Altmer seem to emphasize self-learning (the path to Alaxon as you seek perfection in your vocation), mentorship (highly competitive with artists and the actors in the House of Revelries) and academies like Illumination Academy and the College of Sapiarchs. Illumination Academy has an extremely magical library that betters anything we've seen in the Arcane University, College of Winterhold, or a Telvanni Magelord. The College of Sapiarchs, while we don't see a whole lot of their work, does carry out experiments (I don't recall exactly, but I want to say the Sapiarchs are montioring the crab eggs of the Queen of the Reef WB to figure out corruption levels, or something like that), and they work together as colleagues in their different disciplines. Did I mention they work together? That's huge, because the Telvanni Magelords don't and the other magical colleges tend to squabble over politics. The Telvanni are hugely competitive as well, but since they tend towards klingon promotions and dog-eat-dog, the Telvanni Magelords end up being the stand-out-above-the-rest-outliers like Neloth and Divayth Fyr. Whereas the Sapiarchs as a whole have a much greater body of knowledge and successfully protected the Crystal Tower and Summerset from the Sea Sloads for over 300 years (They weren't expecting

Ritemaster Iachesis to be mind magicked into stealing the heart of their defenses, or to be attacked by Leythen's daedra, or for Nocturnal to show up and slaughter most of them in the Crystal Tower at the time.

)

Though if you are going to bring up Divayth Fyr's magical cloning, I'm going to bring up Mannimarco pioneering necromancy and inventing lichhood. I'm hard pressed to find a Dunmer who made as big an impact on Tamriel as a whole as Vanus Galerion did by starting his mages guild to bring magic and magical education to the masses of Tamriel. Vivec isn't the only person who can plan a city. Mournhold and Vivec, meet Shimmerene and Alinor. Different cities, to be sure, but all planned out and built as excellent examples of their architectural styles (and the Altmer built theirs without infusions of divine blessings from Vivec).

Personally, I don't think the Altmer feel primitive. They feel - less than they could have been, thanks to ZOS - like very high end medieval fantasy. To use a Lord of the Rings analogy, they feel like Gondor or the Numenorians, with shades of Rivendell. Which is a little disappointing, since I think many of us were hoping for something closer to the experience we had in TES III where we were immersed in an alien, utterly weird culture, only this time with more magic.

Now, I will be blunt. If you are determined to say that the Dunmer are better, I'm not going to convince you. Its a little hard to do that when you've got all of the rich detail of TES III to argue from on top of ESO, and I've got 1 zone and 1 Chapter and devs who want to retcon half the existing lore. But please, don't overlook the accomplishments the Altmer actually do have or pretend that they are somehow more 'primitive" than what we've seen from the other races in Tamriel.

I'm not being biased toward the dunmer if that's what you think. The Altmer were my favorite race by far until very recently.

I'm not going to pretend cathedrals aren't impressive, but compared to Vivec alone it doesn't quite compare. I mean, we already went over the need for ventilation and the complex irrigation that would require either advanced magic or engineering, but just the shape of the cantons alone feels more impressive than stacking a bunch of blocks on top of each other. The same goes for redoran architecture. Those kinds of organic shapes are very difficult to make without modern tools and methods, or some sort of moldable material. Again, I understand how impressive medieval stonemasonry is, but I'm comparing it to other things we've seen in Tamriel.

I get what you're saying though. I probably am disparaging the altmer a little too much. It's just sad that, on one hand we get "primitive" tribes who can build gigantic structures with mechanized components, another race of elves who build sewer systems with modern pipes, and can build cities out of magic and mushrooms, and on the other hand we get the Altmer, who live in medieval Europe.

For some reason, Zenimax decided to make the Altmer, of all people, more "grounded" and "realistic" (their words). These guys are supposed to be the most "elven" of elves, and yet everything they do and build seems so weirdly human and out of step with the other elven races.

It's just a bit disappointing, and makes the Altmer feel less...unique I guess. I wasn't asking for them to be 100% superior to every other race in every other way. But in terms of magic and science? I thought that was literally their whole thing. I just don't know what there really is to distinguish them anymore. The one thing that supposedly justified their arrogance doesn't really seem to be there. If it is there, then as you noted, we don't really get to see it or explore much of it. It just leaves me unsatisfied.

HappyLittleTree

Argonians are the most advanced race. While every other race suffered through the oblivion crisis the hist and argonians emerged victorious.

Dunmer still think that they enslaved the people of the roots. But in fact if the Saxhleel ever had seen the dunmer as a threat they would have done something about them.

"The Hist gave his people life, form, purpose. It was the Hist who had seen through the shadows to the Oblivion crisis, who called all of the people back to the marsh, defeated the forces of Mehrunes Dagon, drove the Empire into the sea, and laid waste to their ancient enemies in Morrowind." ―Mere-Glim

VaranisArano

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

scipionumatia wrote: »

Their education systems are supposed to be the best there is, granted there is not an elder scrolls game where you get to enroll in an altmer university so we dont know much of what they would study. I can say though that literacy is common in the elder scrolls universe, even for those who dont have any kind of formal education so i wouldnt use that as a gold standard. Also its very common for present civilizations to occupy and utilize items from the deceased technologically superior predecessors. Its a running theme you can find in every elder scrolls game. The altmer utilize the aldmer tech the same way the dwemer utilize chimer and dwarven tech.
I think my main point is still valid- The altmer are very organized and operate to bolster their race, they seek knowledge and education. The dunmer are organized among their inner circles and compete against everyone who is considered an outsider, including rival dunmer organizations. They seek power. Not one is superior to the other unless you take into consideration the cultural target theyre trying to achieve. The altmer as a race have a relative common goal, while the dunmer are continuously fighting among themselves to determine what that goal should be.
Also i thought we were just comparing altmer to dunmer, not altmer vs everyone. If we are taking all races into account for which is the most superior id have to say the imperials take the cake.

All this talk of the dunmers wants me to make one, in all the elder scrolls games ive ever played ive not once made a dunmer character. Ive made altmers but that was cause the racial passive was the most flexible for damage. with dunmer your kinda pointed in the fire direction and whenever i make a mag dk i end up going argonian. I played skyrim through as an bosmer the first time, and an orc the second time. morrowind i played through as a breton. and in eso ive never made one, i really should, just dont know what class to make, mag dk seems the only fitting one tbh. maybe magblade.

So the thing you claim makes the altmer advanced is something we never get to see or interact with...that’s pretty typical of the elder scrolls at this point I guess.

Yes races can live off their past, but the Altmer seem to have nothing of their own, not even mass-producable recreations or refinements of ancient technology. They’re just medieval europeans while the dunmer have modern engineering and magical cloning. Even the nords had ruins with mechanized parts thousands of years ago.

In their attempt to make the altmer feel “grounded”, Zenimax made them more primitive than half of Tamriel.

You say they're "just medieval europeans" like building cathedrals isn't an amazing feat of engineering.

The Altmer have entire cities built like that. Flying buttresses and all. Oh, and they've got sewer systems too, we get to see Shimmerene's. We're not talking Breton cities with a few stone buildings like the castle and the guilds while everyone else just builds inside the city walls and a glorified cave system for a sewer like Wayrest. We're talking whole cities, planned out to make full use of vertical space, and beautiful in the style of Mont St. Michel or Neuschwanstein. Mournhold and Vivec's sewer might power fountains, but Shimmerene's is no slouch in the "hey, people live down here and its not completely filthy" department.

The Altmer can produce large panes of clear glass, as we see in their greenhouses. Its not modern glass, sure, but its pretty hard to make uniform clear panes of glass to the extent the Altmer do.This also indicates a rather high degree of agricultural knowledge since they use greenhouses. The Dunmer focus on fungi, obviously, since Vvardenfell's got a lot of that. The Altmer don't have anything as showy as mushroom houses, but frankly, they've got a very tolerable climate and enough stoneworkers to build awesome cities, so why would they bother?

From what we can tell of their schooling, they use magic more intensively and school more of their populaiton than we've seen previously. As far as I can tell, the Dunmer seem to work on a master/apprentice system where you get a mentor for a task from your house and you learn from that person. At least, that's how outlanders like our Nerevarine get taught how to do things. The Altmer seem to emphasize self-learning (the path to Alaxon as you seek perfection in your vocation), mentorship (highly competitive with artists and the actors in the House of Revelries) and academies like Illumination Academy and the College of Sapiarchs. Illumination Academy has an extremely magical library that betters anything we've seen in the Arcane University, College of Winterhold, or a Telvanni Magelord. The College of Sapiarchs, while we don't see a whole lot of their work, does carry out experiments (I don't recall exactly, but I want to say the Sapiarchs are montioring the crab eggs of the Queen of the Reef WB to figure out corruption levels, or something like that), and they work together as colleagues in their different disciplines. Did I mention they work together? That's huge, because the Telvanni Magelords don't and the other magical colleges tend to squabble over politics. The Telvanni are hugely competitive as well, but since they tend towards klingon promotions and dog-eat-dog, the Telvanni Magelords end up being the stand-out-above-the-rest-outliers like Neloth and Divayth Fyr. Whereas the Sapiarchs as a whole have a much greater body of knowledge and successfully protected the Crystal Tower and Summerset from the Sea Sloads for over 300 years (They weren't expecting

Ritemaster Iachesis to be mind magicked into stealing the heart of their defenses, or to be attacked by Leythen's daedra, or for Nocturnal to show up and slaughter most of them in the Crystal Tower at the time.

)

Though if you are going to bring up Divayth Fyr's magical cloning, I'm going to bring up Mannimarco pioneering necromancy and inventing lichhood. I'm hard pressed to find a Dunmer who made as big an impact on Tamriel as a whole as Vanus Galerion did by starting his mages guild to bring magic and magical education to the masses of Tamriel. Vivec isn't the only person who can plan a city. Mournhold and Vivec, meet Shimmerene and Alinor. Different cities, to be sure, but all planned out and built as excellent examples of their architectural styles (and the Altmer built theirs without infusions of divine blessings from Vivec).

Personally, I don't think the Altmer feel primitive. They feel - less than they could have been, thanks to ZOS - like very high end medieval fantasy. To use a Lord of the Rings analogy, they feel like Gondor or the Numenorians, with shades of Rivendell. Which is a little disappointing, since I think many of us were hoping for something closer to the experience we had in TES III where we were immersed in an alien, utterly weird culture, only this time with more magic.

Now, I will be blunt. If you are determined to say that the Dunmer are better, I'm not going to convince you. Its a little hard to do that when you've got all of the rich detail of TES III to argue from on top of ESO, and I've got 1 zone and 1 Chapter and devs who want to retcon half the existing lore. But please, don't overlook the accomplishments the Altmer actually do have or pretend that they are somehow more 'primitive" than what we've seen from the other races in Tamriel.

I'm not being biased toward the dunmer if that's what you think. The Altmer were my favorite race by far until very recently.

I'm not going to pretend cathedrals aren't impressive, but compared to Vivec alone it doesn't quite compare. I mean, we already went over the need for ventilation and the complex irrigation that would require either advanced magic or engineering, but just the shape of the cantons alone feels more impressive than stacking a bunch of blocks on top of each other. The same goes for redoran architecture. Those kinds of organic shapes are very difficult to make without modern tools and methods, or some sort of moldable material. Again, I understand how impressive medieval stonemasonry is, but I'm comparing it to other things we've seen in Tamriel.

I get what you're saying though. I probably am disparaging the altmer a little too much. It's just sad that, on one hand we get "primitive" tribes who can build gigantic structures with mechanized components, another race of elves who build sewer systems with modern pipes, and can build cities out of magic and mushrooms, and on the other hand we get the Altmer, who live in medieval Europe.

For some reason, Zenimax decided to make the Altmer, of all people, more "grounded" and "realistic" (their words). These guys are supposed to be the most "elven" of elves, and yet everything they do and build seems so weirdly human and out of step with the other elven races.

It's just a bit disappointing, and makes the Altmer feel less...unique I guess. I wasn't asking for them to be 100% superior to every other race in every other way. But in terms of magic and science? I thought that was literally their whole thing. I just don't know what there really is to distinguish them anymore. The one thing that supposedly justified their arrogance doesn't really seem to be there. If it is there, then as you noted, we don't really get to see it or explore much of it. It just leaves me unsatisfied.

The Redorans are using insect shells as the basis for their houses, so I'm a little less impressed with their architecture.

The cantons look cool, but as we saw in the Morrowind Chapter, Vivec is liberally handing out his (stolen) divine essence to get them built from brick, wood, and adobe. Talk about an unfair advantage. Same thing for Clockwork City, where not only does Sotha Sil have the advantage of having known and fought the Dwemer, he's got more stolen energy to work with. The dude's a genius, to be sure, but he wasn't building that stuff for Nerevar before he got his paws on the tools of Kagrenac which were made by the Deemed in the first place, you know?

In contrast, the Altmer seem to have a preference for vertical cities with a lot of towers, with absolutely beautiful gothic style buildings which are pretty incredible feats of engineering even for a single building much less a whole city. And they don't have a ready source of divine energy like the heart of Lorkhan to tap into when they build, and unlike the Tribunal, they work with Crystal Tower's energy on their own with needing intermediary tools created by another race.

I too wish ZOS had given the Altmer more in terms of magic and science. I do think that the more exotic environments of the Dunmer makes it easier to overlook the accomplishments of the Altmer in their own, much more hospitable environment.

MythicEmperor

DarkScatha wrote: »

Argonians are the most advanced race. While every other race suffered through the oblivion crisis the hist and argonians emerged victorious.

Dunmer still think that they enslaved the people of the roots. But in fact if the Saxhleel ever had seen the dunmer as a threat they would have done something about them.

"The Hist gave his people life, form, purpose. It was the Hist who had seen through the shadows to the Oblivion crisis, who called all of the people back to the marsh, defeated the forces of Mehrunes Dagon, drove the Empire into the sea, and laid waste to their ancient enemies in Morrowind." ―Mere-Glim

Mud huts are clearly a sign of ingenuity and superiority. Fear not; if you wallow in your own filfth, you are an superior being!

Ah, so the Argonians are advanced because they were given a warning by the Hist before the Oblivion Crisis, allowing them to prepare? Yes, that seems like a fair comparison indeed. I am certain no other race could possibly have benefited from being called to their homeland to prepare for an invasion.

Speaking of being called to one’s homeland, the Argonians have been and always will be slaves- no, not to the Dunmer, but to the Hist. Once you join the hive mind collective by drinking the tree sap, you are no longer free. Argonians are just puppets tugged along on a leash by some trees. Very impressive.

If anything, ‘slavery’ to the Dunmer is the Argonian’s only source of freedom. The offspring who do not drink the sap are mentally free beings. Why would anyone want to go back to Black Marsh when the Telvanni and Dres give you food, quarter, and freedom?

Yes, it was very impressive for the Argonians to invade Morrowind after the Dunmer lost their gods, had a moon fall directly onto one of their largest cities, and had a volcano destroy many more. It’s almost as if the ‘invading’ part was already done for the Argonians and they just came in and slaughtered innocent women and children. Peculiar.

VaranisArano

MythicEmperor wrote: »

DarkScatha wrote: »

Argonians are the most advanced race. While every other race suffered through the oblivion crisis the hist and argonians emerged victorious.

Dunmer still think that they enslaved the people of the roots. But in fact if the Saxhleel ever had seen the dunmer as a threat they would have done something about them.

"The Hist gave his people life, form, purpose. It was the Hist who had seen through the shadows to the Oblivion crisis, who called all of the people back to the marsh, defeated the forces of Mehrunes Dagon, drove the Empire into the sea, and laid waste to their ancient enemies in Morrowind." ―Mere-Glim

Mud huts are clearly a sign of ingenuity and superiority. Fear not; if you wallow in your own filfth, you are an superior being!

Ah, so the Argonians are advanced because they were given a warning by the Hist before the Oblivion Crisis, allowing them to prepare? Yes, that seems like a fair comparison indeed. I am certain no other race could possibly have benefited from being called to their homeland to prepare for an invasion.

Speaking of being called to one’s homeland, the Argonians have been and always will be slaves- no, not to the Dunmer, but to the Hist. Once you join the hive mind collective by drinking the tree sap, you are no longer free. Argonians are just puppets tugged along on a leash by some trees. Very impressive.

If anything, ‘slavery’ to the Dunmer is the Argonian’s only source of freedom. The offspring who do not drink the sap are mentally free beings. Why would anyone want to go back to Black Marsh when the Telvanni and Dres give you food, quarter, and freedom?

Yes, it was very impressive for the Argonians to invade Morrowind after the Dunmer lost their gods, had a moon fall directly onto one of their largest cities, and had a volcano destroy many more. It’s almost as if the ‘invading’ part was already done for the Argonians and they just came in and slaughtered innocent women and children. Peculiar.

I know this is role play, so its pretty pointless to engage with this bunch of biased BS. I could go into more details or compare the superior reaction of the Host with the pathetic blindness and foolishness of the Tribunal, but I dont see the point in having a serious argument with anyone who's going to role play about the benefits of Dres and Telvanni slavery. I've tried before, and it tends to aggravate me more than its worth.

I'm just going to note that the Tribunal could have better prepared the Dunmer for the Oblivion Crisis (It's foreshadowed in the Tribunal DLC, so Almalexia had some warning but was too self-absorbed to do anything), better prepared for Red Year (Vivec knew the moon was coming down), and Dunmer deserved everything they got from the Saxheel during Red Year and leave it there.

StamWhipCultist

I am not sure what culture is advanced there.
On one hand we have culture of war driven racists, and on other hand we have culture of war driven slavers.
Both are acting like they discovered toilet and others should pay them respect for being such majestic beings.
Both are elves and evil.

Khajiit > any elven race in ESO.

psychotrip

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

scipionumatia wrote: »

Their education systems are supposed to be the best there is, granted there is not an elder scrolls game where you get to enroll in an altmer university so we dont know much of what they would study. I can say though that literacy is common in the elder scrolls universe, even for those who dont have any kind of formal education so i wouldnt use that as a gold standard. Also its very common for present civilizations to occupy and utilize items from the deceased technologically superior predecessors. Its a running theme you can find in every elder scrolls game. The altmer utilize the aldmer tech the same way the dwemer utilize chimer and dwarven tech.
I think my main point is still valid- The altmer are very organized and operate to bolster their race, they seek knowledge and education. The dunmer are organized among their inner circles and compete against everyone who is considered an outsider, including rival dunmer organizations. They seek power. Not one is superior to the other unless you take into consideration the cultural target theyre trying to achieve. The altmer as a race have a relative common goal, while the dunmer are continuously fighting among themselves to determine what that goal should be.
Also i thought we were just comparing altmer to dunmer, not altmer vs everyone. If we are taking all races into account for which is the most superior id have to say the imperials take the cake.

All this talk of the dunmers wants me to make one, in all the elder scrolls games ive ever played ive not once made a dunmer character. Ive made altmers but that was cause the racial passive was the most flexible for damage. with dunmer your kinda pointed in the fire direction and whenever i make a mag dk i end up going argonian. I played skyrim through as an bosmer the first time, and an orc the second time. morrowind i played through as a breton. and in eso ive never made one, i really should, just dont know what class to make, mag dk seems the only fitting one tbh. maybe magblade.

So the thing you claim makes the altmer advanced is something we never get to see or interact with...that’s pretty typical of the elder scrolls at this point I guess.

Yes races can live off their past, but the Altmer seem to have nothing of their own, not even mass-producable recreations or refinements of ancient technology. They’re just medieval europeans while the dunmer have modern engineering and magical cloning. Even the nords had ruins with mechanized parts thousands of years ago.

In their attempt to make the altmer feel “grounded”, Zenimax made them more primitive than half of Tamriel.

You say they're "just medieval europeans" like building cathedrals isn't an amazing feat of engineering.

The Altmer have entire cities built like that. Flying buttresses and all. Oh, and they've got sewer systems too, we get to see Shimmerene's. We're not talking Breton cities with a few stone buildings like the castle and the guilds while everyone else just builds inside the city walls and a glorified cave system for a sewer like Wayrest. We're talking whole cities, planned out to make full use of vertical space, and beautiful in the style of Mont St. Michel or Neuschwanstein. Mournhold and Vivec's sewer might power fountains, but Shimmerene's is no slouch in the "hey, people live down here and its not completely filthy" department.

The Altmer can produce large panes of clear glass, as we see in their greenhouses. Its not modern glass, sure, but its pretty hard to make uniform clear panes of glass to the extent the Altmer do.This also indicates a rather high degree of agricultural knowledge since they use greenhouses. The Dunmer focus on fungi, obviously, since Vvardenfell's got a lot of that. The Altmer don't have anything as showy as mushroom houses, but frankly, they've got a very tolerable climate and enough stoneworkers to build awesome cities, so why would they bother?

From what we can tell of their schooling, they use magic more intensively and school more of their populaiton than we've seen previously. As far as I can tell, the Dunmer seem to work on a master/apprentice system where you get a mentor for a task from your house and you learn from that person. At least, that's how outlanders like our Nerevarine get taught how to do things. The Altmer seem to emphasize self-learning (the path to Alaxon as you seek perfection in your vocation), mentorship (highly competitive with artists and the actors in the House of Revelries) and academies like Illumination Academy and the College of Sapiarchs. Illumination Academy has an extremely magical library that betters anything we've seen in the Arcane University, College of Winterhold, or a Telvanni Magelord. The College of Sapiarchs, while we don't see a whole lot of their work, does carry out experiments (I don't recall exactly, but I want to say the Sapiarchs are montioring the crab eggs of the Queen of the Reef WB to figure out corruption levels, or something like that), and they work together as colleagues in their different disciplines. Did I mention they work together? That's huge, because the Telvanni Magelords don't and the other magical colleges tend to squabble over politics. The Telvanni are hugely competitive as well, but since they tend towards klingon promotions and dog-eat-dog, the Telvanni Magelords end up being the stand-out-above-the-rest-outliers like Neloth and Divayth Fyr. Whereas the Sapiarchs as a whole have a much greater body of knowledge and successfully protected the Crystal Tower and Summerset from the Sea Sloads for over 300 years (They weren't expecting

Ritemaster Iachesis to be mind magicked into stealing the heart of their defenses, or to be attacked by Leythen's daedra, or for Nocturnal to show up and slaughter most of them in the Crystal Tower at the time.

)

Though if you are going to bring up Divayth Fyr's magical cloning, I'm going to bring up Mannimarco pioneering necromancy and inventing lichhood. I'm hard pressed to find a Dunmer who made as big an impact on Tamriel as a whole as Vanus Galerion did by starting his mages guild to bring magic and magical education to the masses of Tamriel. Vivec isn't the only person who can plan a city. Mournhold and Vivec, meet Shimmerene and Alinor. Different cities, to be sure, but all planned out and built as excellent examples of their architectural styles (and the Altmer built theirs without infusions of divine blessings from Vivec).

Personally, I don't think the Altmer feel primitive. They feel - less than they could have been, thanks to ZOS - like very high end medieval fantasy. To use a Lord of the Rings analogy, they feel like Gondor or the Numenorians, with shades of Rivendell. Which is a little disappointing, since I think many of us were hoping for something closer to the experience we had in TES III where we were immersed in an alien, utterly weird culture, only this time with more magic.

Now, I will be blunt. If you are determined to say that the Dunmer are better, I'm not going to convince you. Its a little hard to do that when you've got all of the rich detail of TES III to argue from on top of ESO, and I've got 1 zone and 1 Chapter and devs who want to retcon half the existing lore. But please, don't overlook the accomplishments the Altmer actually do have or pretend that they are somehow more 'primitive" than what we've seen from the other races in Tamriel.

I'm not being biased toward the dunmer if that's what you think. The Altmer were my favorite race by far until very recently.

I'm not going to pretend cathedrals aren't impressive, but compared to Vivec alone it doesn't quite compare. I mean, we already went over the need for ventilation and the complex irrigation that would require either advanced magic or engineering, but just the shape of the cantons alone feels more impressive than stacking a bunch of blocks on top of each other. The same goes for redoran architecture. Those kinds of organic shapes are very difficult to make without modern tools and methods, or some sort of moldable material. Again, I understand how impressive medieval stonemasonry is, but I'm comparing it to other things we've seen in Tamriel.

I get what you're saying though. I probably am disparaging the altmer a little too much. It's just sad that, on one hand we get "primitive" tribes who can build gigantic structures with mechanized components, another race of elves who build sewer systems with modern pipes, and can build cities out of magic and mushrooms, and on the other hand we get the Altmer, who live in medieval Europe.

For some reason, Zenimax decided to make the Altmer, of all people, more "grounded" and "realistic" (their words). These guys are supposed to be the most "elven" of elves, and yet everything they do and build seems so weirdly human and out of step with the other elven races.

It's just a bit disappointing, and makes the Altmer feel less...unique I guess. I wasn't asking for them to be 100% superior to every other race in every other way. But in terms of magic and science? I thought that was literally their whole thing. I just don't know what there really is to distinguish them anymore. The one thing that supposedly justified their arrogance doesn't really seem to be there. If it is there, then as you noted, we don't really get to see it or explore much of it. It just leaves me unsatisfied.

The Redorans are using insect shells as the basis for their houses, so I'm a little less impressed with their architecture.

The cantons look cool, but as we saw in the Morrowind Chapter, Vivec is liberally handing out his (stolen) divine essence to get them built from brick, wood, and adobe. Talk about an unfair advantage. Same thing for Clockwork City, where not only does Sotha Sil have the advantage of having known and fought the Dwemer, he's got more stolen energy to work with. The dude's a genius, to be sure, but he wasn't building that stuff for Nerevar before he got his paws on the tools of Kagrenac which were made by the Deemed in the first place, you know?

In contrast, the Altmer seem to have a preference for vertical cities with a lot of towers, with absolutely beautiful gothic style buildings which are pretty incredible feats of engineering even for a single building much less a whole city. And they don't have a ready source of divine energy like the heart of Lorkhan to tap into when they build, and unlike the Tribunal, they work with Crystal Tower's energy on their own with needing intermediary tools created by another race.

I too wish ZOS had given the Altmer more in terms of magic and science. I do think that the more exotic environments of the Dunmer makes it easier to overlook the accomplishments of the Altmer in their own, much more hospitable environment.

The Redoran don't use insect shells for their houses. Unless it's the giant emperor crab of Ald-Ruhn (Or unless this is a retcon I don't know about). Their homes are inspired by insects and organic shapes. So yeah, pretty impressive to use stone / concrete / or whatever inorganic material they're using to make buildings like that.

I'm not sure how I feel about ignoring the Tribunal when it comes to Dunmer achievements and accomplishments, but I'll bite for now. Divine help or not, Vivec city can't happen without a complex ventilation system and irrigation system. I'm not an expert on this stuff, but being able to pump water upward to the top of a neighborhood-sized pyramid is no joke.

But yeah, if we're going to ignore the Tribunal entirely, then we may as well ignore all the Aldmer stuff the Altmer use, like the Crystal Tower.

And I took a look at the sewers in Shimmerene. Old Mournhold is centuries ahead of it easily. Again, modern-ish pipes that don't even leak after thousands of years (albeit with maintainance) vs. a half ruined, flooding, underground canal.

VaranisArano

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

scipionumatia wrote: »

Their education systems are supposed to be the best there is, granted there is not an elder scrolls game where you get to enroll in an altmer university so we dont know much of what they would study. I can say though that literacy is common in the elder scrolls universe, even for those who dont have any kind of formal education so i wouldnt use that as a gold standard. Also its very common for present civilizations to occupy and utilize items from the deceased technologically superior predecessors. Its a running theme you can find in every elder scrolls game. The altmer utilize the aldmer tech the same way the dwemer utilize chimer and dwarven tech.
I think my main point is still valid- The altmer are very organized and operate to bolster their race, they seek knowledge and education. The dunmer are organized among their inner circles and compete against everyone who is considered an outsider, including rival dunmer organizations. They seek power. Not one is superior to the other unless you take into consideration the cultural target theyre trying to achieve. The altmer as a race have a relative common goal, while the dunmer are continuously fighting among themselves to determine what that goal should be.
Also i thought we were just comparing altmer to dunmer, not altmer vs everyone. If we are taking all races into account for which is the most superior id have to say the imperials take the cake.

All this talk of the dunmers wants me to make one, in all the elder scrolls games ive ever played ive not once made a dunmer character. Ive made altmers but that was cause the racial passive was the most flexible for damage. with dunmer your kinda pointed in the fire direction and whenever i make a mag dk i end up going argonian. I played skyrim through as an bosmer the first time, and an orc the second time. morrowind i played through as a breton. and in eso ive never made one, i really should, just dont know what class to make, mag dk seems the only fitting one tbh. maybe magblade.

So the thing you claim makes the altmer advanced is something we never get to see or interact with...that’s pretty typical of the elder scrolls at this point I guess.

Yes races can live off their past, but the Altmer seem to have nothing of their own, not even mass-producable recreations or refinements of ancient technology. They’re just medieval europeans while the dunmer have modern engineering and magical cloning. Even the nords had ruins with mechanized parts thousands of years ago.

In their attempt to make the altmer feel “grounded”, Zenimax made them more primitive than half of Tamriel.

You say they're "just medieval europeans" like building cathedrals isn't an amazing feat of engineering.

The Altmer have entire cities built like that. Flying buttresses and all. Oh, and they've got sewer systems too, we get to see Shimmerene's. We're not talking Breton cities with a few stone buildings like the castle and the guilds while everyone else just builds inside the city walls and a glorified cave system for a sewer like Wayrest. We're talking whole cities, planned out to make full use of vertical space, and beautiful in the style of Mont St. Michel or Neuschwanstein. Mournhold and Vivec's sewer might power fountains, but Shimmerene's is no slouch in the "hey, people live down here and its not completely filthy" department.

The Altmer can produce large panes of clear glass, as we see in their greenhouses. Its not modern glass, sure, but its pretty hard to make uniform clear panes of glass to the extent the Altmer do.This also indicates a rather high degree of agricultural knowledge since they use greenhouses. The Dunmer focus on fungi, obviously, since Vvardenfell's got a lot of that. The Altmer don't have anything as showy as mushroom houses, but frankly, they've got a very tolerable climate and enough stoneworkers to build awesome cities, so why would they bother?

From what we can tell of their schooling, they use magic more intensively and school more of their populaiton than we've seen previously. As far as I can tell, the Dunmer seem to work on a master/apprentice system where you get a mentor for a task from your house and you learn from that person. At least, that's how outlanders like our Nerevarine get taught how to do things. The Altmer seem to emphasize self-learning (the path to Alaxon as you seek perfection in your vocation), mentorship (highly competitive with artists and the actors in the House of Revelries) and academies like Illumination Academy and the College of Sapiarchs. Illumination Academy has an extremely magical library that betters anything we've seen in the Arcane University, College of Winterhold, or a Telvanni Magelord. The College of Sapiarchs, while we don't see a whole lot of their work, does carry out experiments (I don't recall exactly, but I want to say the Sapiarchs are montioring the crab eggs of the Queen of the Reef WB to figure out corruption levels, or something like that), and they work together as colleagues in their different disciplines. Did I mention they work together? That's huge, because the Telvanni Magelords don't and the other magical colleges tend to squabble over politics. The Telvanni are hugely competitive as well, but since they tend towards klingon promotions and dog-eat-dog, the Telvanni Magelords end up being the stand-out-above-the-rest-outliers like Neloth and Divayth Fyr. Whereas the Sapiarchs as a whole have a much greater body of knowledge and successfully protected the Crystal Tower and Summerset from the Sea Sloads for over 300 years (They weren't expecting

Ritemaster Iachesis to be mind magicked into stealing the heart of their defenses, or to be attacked by Leythen's daedra, or for Nocturnal to show up and slaughter most of them in the Crystal Tower at the time.

)

Though if you are going to bring up Divayth Fyr's magical cloning, I'm going to bring up Mannimarco pioneering necromancy and inventing lichhood. I'm hard pressed to find a Dunmer who made as big an impact on Tamriel as a whole as Vanus Galerion did by starting his mages guild to bring magic and magical education to the masses of Tamriel. Vivec isn't the only person who can plan a city. Mournhold and Vivec, meet Shimmerene and Alinor. Different cities, to be sure, but all planned out and built as excellent examples of their architectural styles (and the Altmer built theirs without infusions of divine blessings from Vivec).

Personally, I don't think the Altmer feel primitive. They feel - less than they could have been, thanks to ZOS - like very high end medieval fantasy. To use a Lord of the Rings analogy, they feel like Gondor or the Numenorians, with shades of Rivendell. Which is a little disappointing, since I think many of us were hoping for something closer to the experience we had in TES III where we were immersed in an alien, utterly weird culture, only this time with more magic.

Now, I will be blunt. If you are determined to say that the Dunmer are better, I'm not going to convince you. Its a little hard to do that when you've got all of the rich detail of TES III to argue from on top of ESO, and I've got 1 zone and 1 Chapter and devs who want to retcon half the existing lore. But please, don't overlook the accomplishments the Altmer actually do have or pretend that they are somehow more 'primitive" than what we've seen from the other races in Tamriel.

I'm not being biased toward the dunmer if that's what you think. The Altmer were my favorite race by far until very recently.

I'm not going to pretend cathedrals aren't impressive, but compared to Vivec alone it doesn't quite compare. I mean, we already went over the need for ventilation and the complex irrigation that would require either advanced magic or engineering, but just the shape of the cantons alone feels more impressive than stacking a bunch of blocks on top of each other. The same goes for redoran architecture. Those kinds of organic shapes are very difficult to make without modern tools and methods, or some sort of moldable material. Again, I understand how impressive medieval stonemasonry is, but I'm comparing it to other things we've seen in Tamriel.

I get what you're saying though. I probably am disparaging the altmer a little too much. It's just sad that, on one hand we get "primitive" tribes who can build gigantic structures with mechanized components, another race of elves who build sewer systems with modern pipes, and can build cities out of magic and mushrooms, and on the other hand we get the Altmer, who live in medieval Europe.

For some reason, Zenimax decided to make the Altmer, of all people, more "grounded" and "realistic" (their words). These guys are supposed to be the most "elven" of elves, and yet everything they do and build seems so weirdly human and out of step with the other elven races.

It's just a bit disappointing, and makes the Altmer feel less...unique I guess. I wasn't asking for them to be 100% superior to every other race in every other way. But in terms of magic and science? I thought that was literally their whole thing. I just don't know what there really is to distinguish them anymore. The one thing that supposedly justified their arrogance doesn't really seem to be there. If it is there, then as you noted, we don't really get to see it or explore much of it. It just leaves me unsatisfied.

The Redorans are using insect shells as the basis for their houses, so I'm a little less impressed with their architecture.

The cantons look cool, but as we saw in the Morrowind Chapter, Vivec is liberally handing out his (stolen) divine essence to get them built from brick, wood, and adobe. Talk about an unfair advantage. Same thing for Clockwork City, where not only does Sotha Sil have the advantage of having known and fought the Dwemer, he's got more stolen energy to work with. The dude's a genius, to be sure, but he wasn't building that stuff for Nerevar before he got his paws on the tools of Kagrenac which were made by the Deemed in the first place, you know?

In contrast, the Altmer seem to have a preference for vertical cities with a lot of towers, with absolutely beautiful gothic style buildings which are pretty incredible feats of engineering even for a single building much less a whole city. And they don't have a ready source of divine energy like the heart of Lorkhan to tap into when they build, and unlike the Tribunal, they work with Crystal Tower's energy on their own with needing intermediary tools created by another race.

I too wish ZOS had given the Altmer more in terms of magic and science. I do think that the more exotic environments of the Dunmer makes it easier to overlook the accomplishments of the Altmer in their own, much more hospitable environment.

The Redoran don't use insect shells for their houses. Unless it's the giant emperor crab of Ald-Ruhn (Or unless this is a retcon I don't know about). Their homes are inspired by insects and organic shapes. So yeah, pretty impressive to use stone / concrete / or whatever inorganic material they're using to make buildings like that.

I'm not sure how I feel about ignoring the Tribunal when it comes to Dunmer achievements and accomplishments, but I'll bite for now. Divine help or not, Vivec city can't happen without a complex ventilation system and irrigation system. I'm not an expert on this stuff, but being able to pump water upward to the top of a neighborhood-sized pyramid is no joke.

But yeah, if we're going to ignore the Tribunal entirely, then we may as well ignore all the Aldmer stuff the Altmer use, like the Crystal Tower.

And I took a look at the sewers in Shimmerene. Old Mournhold is centuries ahead of it easily. Again, modern-ish pipes that don't even leak after thousands of years (albeit with maintainance) vs. a half ruined, flooding, underground canal.

IIRC, Old Mournhold had lots of sections that were no better than caves. I seem to remember hopping around a bunch of broken pipes when I went to go kill the Dark Brotherhood folks down there, but its been a while since I played the Tribunal DLC. The Dunmer also had the example of the Dwemer when it came to making metal pipes, so I'm not terribly surprised that the Dunmer are more advanced in that regard. You don't stay neighbors with a steam-using race without learning something about how water power works. Unlike the Altmer, who are neighbors with a warlike sea faring race and so the Altmer have the best navy in Tamriel (we've already discussed the superiority of the Altmer navy over the Pact and Covenant in another thread, I believe).

I'm ignoring the Tribunal, because they weren't all that impressive before they used the Tools of Kagrenac to steal their divine powers compared to what they did afterwards. They needed the tools made by the dwemer to manipulate the divine energy of the heart of Lorkhan which they've stolen and used for their purposes.

The Altmer, even if they use the Aldmer Crystal Tower, can at least manage to use it with their own skill. The defenses of Summerset were set up by the Altmer, not the Aldmer.

This does seem to be coming down to personal preference. You see the complexities of the organic shapes in Dunmer architecture and I see the engineering feats of constructing cathedrals on a city-wide scale.

I strongly suspect that most of this comes down to two societies facing different pressures. The Redorans don't use insect shell shapes because they look amazing - they use them because the large insects of Morrowind had shells shaped to help them deal with ash storms Which is needed in Redoran territory. Vivec's cantons don't have an amazing sewer system because the Dunmer are the best at sewers, its because the Dunmer had to make a great sewer system or else their capital was going to be a public health disaster.

Likewise, the Altmer have soaring cities because they have a mountainous island where space is at a premium, so they've learned to build vertically. They face constant attacks from sea so they have to have a good navy in order to survive. They have a fairly temperate climate, so they can excel at agriculture. The Sapiarchs work together, so you don't need to see extreme outliers, whereas the Psijic Order's emphasis on individual research produces more outliers like Mannimarco and Vanus Galerion.

Each society developed differently, and adapted to the different pressures of their environment. Vvardenfell is a more exotic environment, and so the Dunmer have correspondingly exotic adaptions. Summerset is a more familiar, classically fantastical environment, and so the adaptions are more classically fantastical, though no less impressive.

Sporvan

And then there are the ashlanders.... Altmer has this contest waxed I'm afraid.

dodgehopper_ESO

scipionumatia wrote: »

I have to say the altmer are more advanced. Ive read here that many are not impressed with their structures because they are built from stone while the dunmer build structures from the land that grow and etc. I think there is a misconception here between necessity and practicality. For example much of the dunmer homeland is mud and has much volcanic activity, meaning rigid stone structures would not do well in a land which is constantly damp and swamp like with a lot of tectonic tremors. The more sophisticated mushroom structures are a necessity of the landscape and when we compare the quantity of dunmer that live in the sophisticated mushroom structures to those who live in cloth-laden shacks it seems more common for dunmer to be calling the hut a home. Even the dunmer that live off vvardenfell tend to prefer living in stone medieval-esk structures as we see in deshann and ebonhart. A little off topic: where possible, most civilizations we see in the elder scrolls prefer to live in stone structures when the habitat permits. The nords, orc, bretons, altmer, and imperials all choose stone structures predominantly. The khajiit and argonians live in structures that are more attuned to their physicality- being either tall sloping wooden structures or mud huts respectively. The redguards who are nomadic live often in tents, the ones who arent usually live in stone or wood structures. The bosmer live in trees because it is most practical for the region they reside in, and the dunmer live where they live for similar reasons as the bosmer- out of practicality for the region.

All in all i dont think we should look down on the altmer for living in stone structures, they are practical, strong, retain interior climate well, and are resistant to the elements.

Now as to why i think the altmer are superior technologically. They are very organized, arguably the most organized race (imperials are another contender). When it comes to schooling and education structure they provide some of the best if not the best. I consider this schooling and education to be one of their most superior technologies. This is also why they are often found as book keepers, alchemists, or searchers of wisdom. The goal of their culture is to bolster and preserve altmer-kind, and as such they operate to lift each other up for the most part (of course there will be outliers, they are all individuals. im talking as a collective) and to gain as much knowledge as possible. Dunmer on the other hand have a lot of in-fighting, their goals tend to be more "house" specific and their culture more tribal, this selfishness deters growth (when looking at the race as a unit instead of looking at the tribe as a unit).

For the sake of above arguments i am excluding the technologies and methods of the "one ofs" and focusing more broadly on the majority or common members of their societies.

This isnt to say the dunmer or the altmer are inept technologically, just that their technologies are more attuned for their needs. If culture isnt taken into account, we have no gauge to base effectiveness/utility outside of saying "this notable figure did X, and this notable figure did Y", these instances are outliers and i dont think they should be counted as a determining factor of an entire races ingenuity.

just my 2 cents

I believe you make a very good point about the strife in Dunmer society. This is also I believe the good intention behind the evil act of killing Lord Nerevar. The Tribunal was willing to betray their friend (or husband in the case of Almalexia) because they realized the heart of Lorkhan would give them the power to betray the 'good' Daedra and form a more cohesive and prosperous society instead of a bunch of dirt diggers groveling in the mud underneath the heights of true mastery they saw in the face of the Dwemer. In all honesty the Dwemer put all other races on Nirn to shame. They are like Icarus and Daedalus together and their fault is in grasping too hard for the Sun, or in this case their Chief Engineer grasped too far. I do not think Dumac intended for the results that occurred, but I also would not assume the Dwemer are gone forever. Even in the Zero-Sum theory one has to recognize that even if they were destroyed in this Kalpa it does not mean they are lost to the next one. When looking at all the Elves I find the Dwemer to be the pinnacle.

As a side note: I think the madness of the Tribunal and likewise the madness of Dagoth-Ur is related to them tapping into the Heart of the World, something meant more for individuals like Ebonarm, the Ash King, and Talos. Shor is the father of men and his heart and the world of Nirn is theirs. It has always been my contention that the reason the elves hate him so much is that they know Nirn is not theirs, and that they are fading. The psijics (and in some respects the endeavor that Vivec promotes to the people) are just trying to end-run around the problem. Nirn's heart is the heart of Man. Elven cultures keep fading away on Nirn. I think there's an ultimate reason for this in the storyline and it would really not shock me if another race of elves died in Elder Scrolls Six or Seven. I actually would like to see that happen in large part because the palpable loss of a culture adds a certain depth and sadness to the series. The Dwemer and Falmer are fine examples. In their disappearance you recognize the loss of something unique and interesting and it adds an air of mystery.

The fading of the elves as a trope is the act of civilizing the wild world. This story can be picked up even in Greek Mythologies so it goes back a long time. Its the magical hidden creatures of the wild world, holding technologies and magic beyond and alien to the ken of mortal men and in many ways in contention and hateful of mankind's rise against the primordial elements. I definitely think the elder scrolls writers had some of this in mind in their writing. Trinimac/Malacath represents one of those Elven elements that attempted to end Mankind's ultimate domination of Nirn. Mankind was harmed by the wild elements (he gained heaps of mortality) but the Orcs were likewise punished for the attempt.

This is just my big picture theorization on the series so take it with a grain of salt. I could sit here and write out pages on the topic if I wanted to but I don't. Its just a game. :P

Kelces

The Aldmer are certainly advanced in certain sciences as has been mentioned before. But that could aswell lead them to the same demise like the Dwemer's, if not restrained by some humility, which they obviously lack. They seem to be determined to do everything just to get total domination.

On the other hand we have the Dunmer, that have various rivaling factions in their own ranks, which makes certain developments very difficult at best, not to mention certain superstitions that put them in fear of going a certain way. They use their own people just like others as slaves and by that alone are endangering their very survival. I once thought, the Ashlanders were the only "normal" people among them, until I saw their slave pens.

Both are extremely stubborn, that's the whole problem I think.

psychotrip

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

scipionumatia wrote: »

Their education systems are supposed to be the best there is, granted there is not an elder scrolls game where you get to enroll in an altmer university so we dont know much of what they would study. I can say though that literacy is common in the elder scrolls universe, even for those who dont have any kind of formal education so i wouldnt use that as a gold standard. Also its very common for present civilizations to occupy and utilize items from the deceased technologically superior predecessors. Its a running theme you can find in every elder scrolls game. The altmer utilize the aldmer tech the same way the dwemer utilize chimer and dwarven tech.
I think my main point is still valid- The altmer are very organized and operate to bolster their race, they seek knowledge and education. The dunmer are organized among their inner circles and compete against everyone who is considered an outsider, including rival dunmer organizations. They seek power. Not one is superior to the other unless you take into consideration the cultural target theyre trying to achieve. The altmer as a race have a relative common goal, while the dunmer are continuously fighting among themselves to determine what that goal should be.
Also i thought we were just comparing altmer to dunmer, not altmer vs everyone. If we are taking all races into account for which is the most superior id have to say the imperials take the cake.

All this talk of the dunmers wants me to make one, in all the elder scrolls games ive ever played ive not once made a dunmer character. Ive made altmers but that was cause the racial passive was the most flexible for damage. with dunmer your kinda pointed in the fire direction and whenever i make a mag dk i end up going argonian. I played skyrim through as an bosmer the first time, and an orc the second time. morrowind i played through as a breton. and in eso ive never made one, i really should, just dont know what class to make, mag dk seems the only fitting one tbh. maybe magblade.

So the thing you claim makes the altmer advanced is something we never get to see or interact with...that’s pretty typical of the elder scrolls at this point I guess.

Yes races can live off their past, but the Altmer seem to have nothing of their own, not even mass-producable recreations or refinements of ancient technology. They’re just medieval europeans while the dunmer have modern engineering and magical cloning. Even the nords had ruins with mechanized parts thousands of years ago.

In their attempt to make the altmer feel “grounded”, Zenimax made them more primitive than half of Tamriel.

You say they're "just medieval europeans" like building cathedrals isn't an amazing feat of engineering.

The Altmer have entire cities built like that. Flying buttresses and all. Oh, and they've got sewer systems too, we get to see Shimmerene's. We're not talking Breton cities with a few stone buildings like the castle and the guilds while everyone else just builds inside the city walls and a glorified cave system for a sewer like Wayrest. We're talking whole cities, planned out to make full use of vertical space, and beautiful in the style of Mont St. Michel or Neuschwanstein. Mournhold and Vivec's sewer might power fountains, but Shimmerene's is no slouch in the "hey, people live down here and its not completely filthy" department.

The Altmer can produce large panes of clear glass, as we see in their greenhouses. Its not modern glass, sure, but its pretty hard to make uniform clear panes of glass to the extent the Altmer do.This also indicates a rather high degree of agricultural knowledge since they use greenhouses. The Dunmer focus on fungi, obviously, since Vvardenfell's got a lot of that. The Altmer don't have anything as showy as mushroom houses, but frankly, they've got a very tolerable climate and enough stoneworkers to build awesome cities, so why would they bother?

From what we can tell of their schooling, they use magic more intensively and school more of their populaiton than we've seen previously. As far as I can tell, the Dunmer seem to work on a master/apprentice system where you get a mentor for a task from your house and you learn from that person. At least, that's how outlanders like our Nerevarine get taught how to do things. The Altmer seem to emphasize self-learning (the path to Alaxon as you seek perfection in your vocation), mentorship (highly competitive with artists and the actors in the House of Revelries) and academies like Illumination Academy and the College of Sapiarchs. Illumination Academy has an extremely magical library that betters anything we've seen in the Arcane University, College of Winterhold, or a Telvanni Magelord. The College of Sapiarchs, while we don't see a whole lot of their work, does carry out experiments (I don't recall exactly, but I want to say the Sapiarchs are montioring the crab eggs of the Queen of the Reef WB to figure out corruption levels, or something like that), and they work together as colleagues in their different disciplines. Did I mention they work together? That's huge, because the Telvanni Magelords don't and the other magical colleges tend to squabble over politics. The Telvanni are hugely competitive as well, but since they tend towards klingon promotions and dog-eat-dog, the Telvanni Magelords end up being the stand-out-above-the-rest-outliers like Neloth and Divayth Fyr. Whereas the Sapiarchs as a whole have a much greater body of knowledge and successfully protected the Crystal Tower and Summerset from the Sea Sloads for over 300 years (They weren't expecting

Ritemaster Iachesis to be mind magicked into stealing the heart of their defenses, or to be attacked by Leythen's daedra, or for Nocturnal to show up and slaughter most of them in the Crystal Tower at the time.

)

Though if you are going to bring up Divayth Fyr's magical cloning, I'm going to bring up Mannimarco pioneering necromancy and inventing lichhood. I'm hard pressed to find a Dunmer who made as big an impact on Tamriel as a whole as Vanus Galerion did by starting his mages guild to bring magic and magical education to the masses of Tamriel. Vivec isn't the only person who can plan a city. Mournhold and Vivec, meet Shimmerene and Alinor. Different cities, to be sure, but all planned out and built as excellent examples of their architectural styles (and the Altmer built theirs without infusions of divine blessings from Vivec).

Personally, I don't think the Altmer feel primitive. They feel - less than they could have been, thanks to ZOS - like very high end medieval fantasy. To use a Lord of the Rings analogy, they feel like Gondor or the Numenorians, with shades of Rivendell. Which is a little disappointing, since I think many of us were hoping for something closer to the experience we had in TES III where we were immersed in an alien, utterly weird culture, only this time with more magic.

Now, I will be blunt. If you are determined to say that the Dunmer are better, I'm not going to convince you. Its a little hard to do that when you've got all of the rich detail of TES III to argue from on top of ESO, and I've got 1 zone and 1 Chapter and devs who want to retcon half the existing lore. But please, don't overlook the accomplishments the Altmer actually do have or pretend that they are somehow more 'primitive" than what we've seen from the other races in Tamriel.

I'm not being biased toward the dunmer if that's what you think. The Altmer were my favorite race by far until very recently.

I'm not going to pretend cathedrals aren't impressive, but compared to Vivec alone it doesn't quite compare. I mean, we already went over the need for ventilation and the complex irrigation that would require either advanced magic or engineering, but just the shape of the cantons alone feels more impressive than stacking a bunch of blocks on top of each other. The same goes for redoran architecture. Those kinds of organic shapes are very difficult to make without modern tools and methods, or some sort of moldable material. Again, I understand how impressive medieval stonemasonry is, but I'm comparing it to other things we've seen in Tamriel.

I get what you're saying though. I probably am disparaging the altmer a little too much. It's just sad that, on one hand we get "primitive" tribes who can build gigantic structures with mechanized components, another race of elves who build sewer systems with modern pipes, and can build cities out of magic and mushrooms, and on the other hand we get the Altmer, who live in medieval Europe.

For some reason, Zenimax decided to make the Altmer, of all people, more "grounded" and "realistic" (their words). These guys are supposed to be the most "elven" of elves, and yet everything they do and build seems so weirdly human and out of step with the other elven races.

It's just a bit disappointing, and makes the Altmer feel less...unique I guess. I wasn't asking for them to be 100% superior to every other race in every other way. But in terms of magic and science? I thought that was literally their whole thing. I just don't know what there really is to distinguish them anymore. The one thing that supposedly justified their arrogance doesn't really seem to be there. If it is there, then as you noted, we don't really get to see it or explore much of it. It just leaves me unsatisfied.

The Redorans are using insect shells as the basis for their houses, so I'm a little less impressed with their architecture.

The cantons look cool, but as we saw in the Morrowind Chapter, Vivec is liberally handing out his (stolen) divine essence to get them built from brick, wood, and adobe. Talk about an unfair advantage. Same thing for Clockwork City, where not only does Sotha Sil have the advantage of having known and fought the Dwemer, he's got more stolen energy to work with. The dude's a genius, to be sure, but he wasn't building that stuff for Nerevar before he got his paws on the tools of Kagrenac which were made by the Deemed in the first place, you know?

In contrast, the Altmer seem to have a preference for vertical cities with a lot of towers, with absolutely beautiful gothic style buildings which are pretty incredible feats of engineering even for a single building much less a whole city. And they don't have a ready source of divine energy like the heart of Lorkhan to tap into when they build, and unlike the Tribunal, they work with Crystal Tower's energy on their own with needing intermediary tools created by another race.

I too wish ZOS had given the Altmer more in terms of magic and science. I do think that the more exotic environments of the Dunmer makes it easier to overlook the accomplishments of the Altmer in their own, much more hospitable environment.

The Redoran don't use insect shells for their houses. Unless it's the giant emperor crab of Ald-Ruhn (Or unless this is a retcon I don't know about). Their homes are inspired by insects and organic shapes. So yeah, pretty impressive to use stone / concrete / or whatever inorganic material they're using to make buildings like that.

I'm not sure how I feel about ignoring the Tribunal when it comes to Dunmer achievements and accomplishments, but I'll bite for now. Divine help or not, Vivec city can't happen without a complex ventilation system and irrigation system. I'm not an expert on this stuff, but being able to pump water upward to the top of a neighborhood-sized pyramid is no joke.

But yeah, if we're going to ignore the Tribunal entirely, then we may as well ignore all the Aldmer stuff the Altmer use, like the Crystal Tower.

And I took a look at the sewers in Shimmerene. Old Mournhold is centuries ahead of it easily. Again, modern-ish pipes that don't even leak after thousands of years (albeit with maintainance) vs. a half ruined, flooding, underground canal.

IIRC, Old Mournhold had lots of sections that were no better than caves. I seem to remember hopping around a bunch of broken pipes when I went to go kill the Dark Brotherhood folks down there, but its been a while since I played the Tribunal DLC. The Dunmer also had the example of the Dwemer when it came to making metal pipes, so I'm not terribly surprised that the Dunmer are more advanced in that regard. You don't stay neighbors with a steam-using race without learning something about how water power works. Unlike the Altmer, who are neighbors with a warlike sea faring race and so the Altmer have the best navy in Tamriel (we've already discussed the superiority of the Altmer navy over the Pact and Covenant in another thread, I believe).

I'm ignoring the Tribunal, because they weren't all that impressive before they used the Tools of Kagrenac to steal their divine powers compared to what they did afterwards. They needed the tools made by the dwemer to manipulate the divine energy of the heart of Lorkhan which they've stolen and used for their purposes.

The Altmer, even if they use the Aldmer Crystal Tower, can at least manage to use it with their own skill. The defenses of Summerset were set up by the Altmer, not the Aldmer.

This does seem to be coming down to personal preference. You see the complexities of the organic shapes in Dunmer architecture and I see the engineering feats of constructing cathedrals on a city-wide scale.

I strongly suspect that most of this comes down to two societies facing different pressures. The Redorans don't use insect shell shapes because they look amazing - they use them because the large insects of Morrowind had shells shaped to help them deal with ash storms Which is needed in Redoran territory. Vivec's cantons don't have an amazing sewer system because the Dunmer are the best at sewers, its because the Dunmer had to make a great sewer system or else their capital was going to be a public health disaster.

Likewise, the Altmer have soaring cities because they have a mountainous island where space is at a premium, so they've learned to build vertically. They face constant attacks from sea so they have to have a good navy in order to survive. They have a fairly temperate climate, so they can excel at agriculture. The Sapiarchs work together, so you don't need to see extreme outliers, whereas the Psijic Order's emphasis on individual research produces more outliers like Mannimarco and Vanus Galerion.

Each society developed differently, and adapted to the different pressures of their environment. Vvardenfell is a more exotic environment, and so the Dunmer have correspondingly exotic adaptions. Summerset is a more familiar, classically fantastical environment, and so the adaptions are more classically fantastical, though no less impressive.

The sewers of old Mournhold were relatively well maintained. They did have entrances to caves that led to the old city however.

Vivec's cantons don't have an amazing sewer system because the Dunmer are the best at sewers, its because the Dunmer had to make a great sewer system or else their capital was going to be a public health disaster.

This is a distinction without a difference. Most innovation comes from adversity. By this logic, most of the most important inventions in human history don't count because they were made to respond to people's needs. I'm not asking which race was forced to be more advanced and which wasn't. I'm not asking who had it easier. I'm asking which society is more magically / technologically advanced. I'm comparing borderline modern feats of engineering with flying buttresses.

I'm ignoring the Tribunal, because they weren't all that impressive before they used the Tools of Kagrenac to steal their divine powers compared to what they did afterwards. They needed the tools made by the dwemer to manipulate the divine energy of the heart of Lorkhan which they've stolen and used for their purposes.

The Altmer, even if they use the Aldmer Crystal Tower, can at least manage to use it with their own skill. The defenses of Summerset were set up by the Altmer, not the Aldmer.

The Tribunal took something someone else made first, and then used it in a way no one else had. It sounds like you're describing the same thing with the Altmer and their Aldmer technology. So again, either both should count or neither. Either way, tell me more about these defenses, since I don't know much about them.

This does seem to be coming down to personal preference. You see the complexities of the organic shapes in Dunmer architecture and I see the engineering feats of constructing cathedrals on a city-wide scale.

You're leaving out the fact that these organic shapes are also being used on a city-wide scale, and are sometimes also gigantic. You're also leaving out the advanced technology required for people to even be able to live inside such structures.

So on one hand you have giant cathedrals on a city-wide scale. Okay yeah that's pretty cool in a vacuum. Then you have organically shaped, town-sized buildings with suitable ventilation systems and modern irrigation...also giant and also on a city-wide scale.

Someone in another thread brought up a good point about other races as well:

The Redguards have firearms and cannons. They have stone/sand mages and healers. The Redguards make the best ships. The Nedes knew enough to connect/control the constellations. Then there was of course Shalidor.

And here its laid bare. This is why I think Zenimax dropped the ball on the Altmer. So many other races and cultures are allowed to be magical and creative and advanced in your own way, but the most intelligent race on Tamriel has to be "grounded".

At the end of the day, Altmer seem to fade into the background while others surpass them with less effort.

(Also just as a side note i'm not actually sure redguards have cannons. I'm trying to find a source for that now. I think the other stuff is still valid though).

qbit

The dunmer are fire resistant. The high elves just stand around snorting moon sugar all day.

psychotrip

qbit wrote: »

The dunmer are fire resistant. The high elves just stand around snorting moon sugar all day.

If we're going by stats then Altmer are super intelligent and better at magic...I just wish this was reflected in the world...

VaranisArano

This might help on the cannons thing with some of the references. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.reddit.com/r/teslore/comments/6fwhtf/cannons_are_a_thing/

I'm also pretty much done arguing over different aspects on culture with you. You've got your points, I've got mine, we're not discussing anything new over several threads now. Its been good discussion, but I think its hit a point of repetition.

As for further examples or talking about the defenses of Crystal Tower in more detail, the best thing I can suggest is for you to play/replay the Main Quest. I haven't replayed the quest while taking screenshots of dialogue yet, so I don't have the references at my fingertips.

Sigtric

This is easy.

Altmer can't figure out how to cure their jaundice.

Dunmer win.

dodgehopper_ESO

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

scipionumatia wrote: »

Their education systems are supposed to be the best there is, granted there is not an elder scrolls game where you get to enroll in an altmer university so we dont know much of what they would study. I can say though that literacy is common in the elder scrolls universe, even for those who dont have any kind of formal education so i wouldnt use that as a gold standard. Also its very common for present civilizations to occupy and utilize items from the deceased technologically superior predecessors. Its a running theme you can find in every elder scrolls game. The altmer utilize the aldmer tech the same way the dwemer utilize chimer and dwarven tech.
I think my main point is still valid- The altmer are very organized and operate to bolster their race, they seek knowledge and education. The dunmer are organized among their inner circles and compete against everyone who is considered an outsider, including rival dunmer organizations. They seek power. Not one is superior to the other unless you take into consideration the cultural target theyre trying to achieve. The altmer as a race have a relative common goal, while the dunmer are continuously fighting among themselves to determine what that goal should be.
Also i thought we were just comparing altmer to dunmer, not altmer vs everyone. If we are taking all races into account for which is the most superior id have to say the imperials take the cake.

All this talk of the dunmers wants me to make one, in all the elder scrolls games ive ever played ive not once made a dunmer character. Ive made altmers but that was cause the racial passive was the most flexible for damage. with dunmer your kinda pointed in the fire direction and whenever i make a mag dk i end up going argonian. I played skyrim through as an bosmer the first time, and an orc the second time. morrowind i played through as a breton. and in eso ive never made one, i really should, just dont know what class to make, mag dk seems the only fitting one tbh. maybe magblade.

So the thing you claim makes the altmer advanced is something we never get to see or interact with...that’s pretty typical of the elder scrolls at this point I guess.

Yes races can live off their past, but the Altmer seem to have nothing of their own, not even mass-producable recreations or refinements of ancient technology. They’re just medieval europeans while the dunmer have modern engineering and magical cloning. Even the nords had ruins with mechanized parts thousands of years ago.

In their attempt to make the altmer feel “grounded”, Zenimax made them more primitive than half of Tamriel.

You say they're "just medieval europeans" like building cathedrals isn't an amazing feat of engineering.

The Altmer have entire cities built like that. Flying buttresses and all. Oh, and they've got sewer systems too, we get to see Shimmerene's. We're not talking Breton cities with a few stone buildings like the castle and the guilds while everyone else just builds inside the city walls and a glorified cave system for a sewer like Wayrest. We're talking whole cities, planned out to make full use of vertical space, and beautiful in the style of Mont St. Michel or Neuschwanstein. Mournhold and Vivec's sewer might power fountains, but Shimmerene's is no slouch in the "hey, people live down here and its not completely filthy" department.

The Altmer can produce large panes of clear glass, as we see in their greenhouses. Its not modern glass, sure, but its pretty hard to make uniform clear panes of glass to the extent the Altmer do.This also indicates a rather high degree of agricultural knowledge since they use greenhouses. The Dunmer focus on fungi, obviously, since Vvardenfell's got a lot of that. The Altmer don't have anything as showy as mushroom houses, but frankly, they've got a very tolerable climate and enough stoneworkers to build awesome cities, so why would they bother?

From what we can tell of their schooling, they use magic more intensively and school more of their populaiton than we've seen previously. As far as I can tell, the Dunmer seem to work on a master/apprentice system where you get a mentor for a task from your house and you learn from that person. At least, that's how outlanders like our Nerevarine get taught how to do things. The Altmer seem to emphasize self-learning (the path to Alaxon as you seek perfection in your vocation), mentorship (highly competitive with artists and the actors in the House of Revelries) and academies like Illumination Academy and the College of Sapiarchs. Illumination Academy has an extremely magical library that betters anything we've seen in the Arcane University, College of Winterhold, or a Telvanni Magelord. The College of Sapiarchs, while we don't see a whole lot of their work, does carry out experiments (I don't recall exactly, but I want to say the Sapiarchs are montioring the crab eggs of the Queen of the Reef WB to figure out corruption levels, or something like that), and they work together as colleagues in their different disciplines. Did I mention they work together? That's huge, because the Telvanni Magelords don't and the other magical colleges tend to squabble over politics. The Telvanni are hugely competitive as well, but since they tend towards klingon promotions and dog-eat-dog, the Telvanni Magelords end up being the stand-out-above-the-rest-outliers like Neloth and Divayth Fyr. Whereas the Sapiarchs as a whole have a much greater body of knowledge and successfully protected the Crystal Tower and Summerset from the Sea Sloads for over 300 years (They weren't expecting

Ritemaster Iachesis to be mind magicked into stealing the heart of their defenses, or to be attacked by Leythen's daedra, or for Nocturnal to show up and slaughter most of them in the Crystal Tower at the time.

)

Though if you are going to bring up Divayth Fyr's magical cloning, I'm going to bring up Mannimarco pioneering necromancy and inventing lichhood. I'm hard pressed to find a Dunmer who made as big an impact on Tamriel as a whole as Vanus Galerion did by starting his mages guild to bring magic and magical education to the masses of Tamriel. Vivec isn't the only person who can plan a city. Mournhold and Vivec, meet Shimmerene and Alinor. Different cities, to be sure, but all planned out and built as excellent examples of their architectural styles (and the Altmer built theirs without infusions of divine blessings from Vivec).

Personally, I don't think the Altmer feel primitive. They feel - less than they could have been, thanks to ZOS - like very high end medieval fantasy. To use a Lord of the Rings analogy, they feel like Gondor or the Numenorians, with shades of Rivendell. Which is a little disappointing, since I think many of us were hoping for something closer to the experience we had in TES III where we were immersed in an alien, utterly weird culture, only this time with more magic.

Now, I will be blunt. If you are determined to say that the Dunmer are better, I'm not going to convince you. Its a little hard to do that when you've got all of the rich detail of TES III to argue from on top of ESO, and I've got 1 zone and 1 Chapter and devs who want to retcon half the existing lore. But please, don't overlook the accomplishments the Altmer actually do have or pretend that they are somehow more 'primitive" than what we've seen from the other races in Tamriel.

I'm not being biased toward the dunmer if that's what you think. The Altmer were my favorite race by far until very recently.

I'm not going to pretend cathedrals aren't impressive, but compared to Vivec alone it doesn't quite compare. I mean, we already went over the need for ventilation and the complex irrigation that would require either advanced magic or engineering, but just the shape of the cantons alone feels more impressive than stacking a bunch of blocks on top of each other. The same goes for redoran architecture. Those kinds of organic shapes are very difficult to make without modern tools and methods, or some sort of moldable material. Again, I understand how impressive medieval stonemasonry is, but I'm comparing it to other things we've seen in Tamriel.

I get what you're saying though. I probably am disparaging the altmer a little too much. It's just sad that, on one hand we get "primitive" tribes who can build gigantic structures with mechanized components, another race of elves who build sewer systems with modern pipes, and can build cities out of magic and mushrooms, and on the other hand we get the Altmer, who live in medieval Europe.

For some reason, Zenimax decided to make the Altmer, of all people, more "grounded" and "realistic" (their words). These guys are supposed to be the most "elven" of elves, and yet everything they do and build seems so weirdly human and out of step with the other elven races.

It's just a bit disappointing, and makes the Altmer feel less...unique I guess. I wasn't asking for them to be 100% superior to every other race in every other way. But in terms of magic and science? I thought that was literally their whole thing. I just don't know what there really is to distinguish them anymore. The one thing that supposedly justified their arrogance doesn't really seem to be there. If it is there, then as you noted, we don't really get to see it or explore much of it. It just leaves me unsatisfied.

The Redorans are using insect shells as the basis for their houses, so I'm a little less impressed with their architecture.

The cantons look cool, but as we saw in the Morrowind Chapter, Vivec is liberally handing out his (stolen) divine essence to get them built from brick, wood, and adobe. Talk about an unfair advantage. Same thing for Clockwork City, where not only does Sotha Sil have the advantage of having known and fought the Dwemer, he's got more stolen energy to work with. The dude's a genius, to be sure, but he wasn't building that stuff for Nerevar before he got his paws on the tools of Kagrenac which were made by the Deemed in the first place, you know?

In contrast, the Altmer seem to have a preference for vertical cities with a lot of towers, with absolutely beautiful gothic style buildings which are pretty incredible feats of engineering even for a single building much less a whole city. And they don't have a ready source of divine energy like the heart of Lorkhan to tap into when they build, and unlike the Tribunal, they work with Crystal Tower's energy on their own with needing intermediary tools created by another race.

I too wish ZOS had given the Altmer more in terms of magic and science. I do think that the more exotic environments of the Dunmer makes it easier to overlook the accomplishments of the Altmer in their own, much more hospitable environment.

The Redoran don't use insect shells for their houses. Unless it's the giant emperor crab of Ald-Ruhn (Or unless this is a retcon I don't know about). Their homes are inspired by insects and organic shapes. So yeah, pretty impressive to use stone / concrete / or whatever inorganic material they're using to make buildings like that.

I'm not sure how I feel about ignoring the Tribunal when it comes to Dunmer achievements and accomplishments, but I'll bite for now. Divine help or not, Vivec city can't happen without a complex ventilation system and irrigation system. I'm not an expert on this stuff, but being able to pump water upward to the top of a neighborhood-sized pyramid is no joke.

But yeah, if we're going to ignore the Tribunal entirely, then we may as well ignore all the Aldmer stuff the Altmer use, like the Crystal Tower.

And I took a look at the sewers in Shimmerene. Old Mournhold is centuries ahead of it easily. Again, modern-ish pipes that don't even leak after thousands of years (albeit with maintainance) vs. a half ruined, flooding, underground canal.

IIRC, Old Mournhold had lots of sections that were no better than caves. I seem to remember hopping around a bunch of broken pipes when I went to go kill the Dark Brotherhood folks down there, but its been a while since I played the Tribunal DLC. The Dunmer also had the example of the Dwemer when it came to making metal pipes, so I'm not terribly surprised that the Dunmer are more advanced in that regard. You don't stay neighbors with a steam-using race without learning something about how water power works. Unlike the Altmer, who are neighbors with a warlike sea faring race and so the Altmer have the best navy in Tamriel (we've already discussed the superiority of the Altmer navy over the Pact and Covenant in another thread, I believe).

I'm ignoring the Tribunal, because they weren't all that impressive before they used the Tools of Kagrenac to steal their divine powers compared to what they did afterwards. They needed the tools made by the dwemer to manipulate the divine energy of the heart of Lorkhan which they've stolen and used for their purposes.

The Altmer, even if they use the Aldmer Crystal Tower, can at least manage to use it with their own skill. The defenses of Summerset were set up by the Altmer, not the Aldmer.

This does seem to be coming down to personal preference. You see the complexities of the organic shapes in Dunmer architecture and I see the engineering feats of constructing cathedrals on a city-wide scale.

I strongly suspect that most of this comes down to two societies facing different pressures. The Redorans don't use insect shell shapes because they look amazing - they use them because the large insects of Morrowind had shells shaped to help them deal with ash storms Which is needed in Redoran territory. Vivec's cantons don't have an amazing sewer system because the Dunmer are the best at sewers, its because the Dunmer had to make a great sewer system or else their capital was going to be a public health disaster.

Likewise, the Altmer have soaring cities because they have a mountainous island where space is at a premium, so they've learned to build vertically. They face constant attacks from sea so they have to have a good navy in order to survive. They have a fairly temperate climate, so they can excel at agriculture. The Sapiarchs work together, so you don't need to see extreme outliers, whereas the Psijic Order's emphasis on individual research produces more outliers like Mannimarco and Vanus Galerion.

Each society developed differently, and adapted to the different pressures of their environment. Vvardenfell is a more exotic environment, and so the Dunmer have correspondingly exotic adaptions. Summerset is a more familiar, classically fantastical environment, and so the adaptions are more classically fantastical, though no less impressive.

The sewers of old Mournhold were relatively well maintained. They did have entrances to caves that led to the old city however.

Vivec's cantons don't have an amazing sewer system because the Dunmer are the best at sewers, its because the Dunmer had to make a great sewer system or else their capital was going to be a public health disaster.

This is a distinction without a difference. Most innovation comes from adversity. By this logic, most of the most important inventions in human history don't count because they were made to respond to people's needs. I'm not asking which race was forced to be more advanced and which wasn't. I'm not asking who had it easier. I'm asking which society is more magically / technologically advanced. I'm comparing borderline modern feats of engineering with flying buttresses.

I'm ignoring the Tribunal, because they weren't all that impressive before they used the Tools of Kagrenac to steal their divine powers compared to what they did afterwards. They needed the tools made by the dwemer to manipulate the divine energy of the heart of Lorkhan which they've stolen and used for their purposes.

The Altmer, even if they use the Aldmer Crystal Tower, can at least manage to use it with their own skill. The defenses of Summerset were set up by the Altmer, not the Aldmer.

The Tribunal took something someone else made first, and then used it in a way no one else had. It sounds like you're describing the same thing with the Altmer and their Aldmer technology. So again, either both should count or neither. Either way, tell me more about these defenses, since I don't know much about them.

This does seem to be coming down to personal preference. You see the complexities of the organic shapes in Dunmer architecture and I see the engineering feats of constructing cathedrals on a city-wide scale.

You're leaving out the fact that these organic shapes are also being used on a city-wide scale, and are sometimes also gigantic. You're also leaving out the advanced technology required for people to even be able to live inside such structures.

So on one hand you have giant cathedrals on a city-wide scale. Okay yeah that's pretty cool in a vacuum. Then you have organically shaped, town-sized buildings with suitable ventilation systems and modern irrigation...also giant and also on a city-wide scale.

Someone in another thread brought up a good point about other races as well:

The Redguards have firearms and cannons. They have stone/sand mages and healers. The Redguards make the best ships. The Nedes knew enough to connect/control the constellations. Then there was of course Shalidor.

And here its laid bare. This is why I think Zenimax dropped the ball on the Altmer. So many other races and cultures are allowed to be magical and creative and advanced in your own way, but the most intelligent race on Tamriel has to be "grounded".

At the end of the day, Altmer seem to fade into the background while others surpass them with less effort.

(Also just as a side note i'm not actually sure redguards have cannons. I'm trying to find a source for that now. I think the other stuff is still valid though).

I can't answer whether the Redguards have Cannons in this era. It is a bit early in the series because they decided to make a prequel. We do know that the Altmer in this era have a few Culanda-stone based magical cannons though. I am pretty sure I'm correct in stating that the Redguards do have cannons but that may very well be just a 'Redguard' thing. Even if that is the case it would be very early in the series and part of the Second Era if I recall correctly. We're in the Second Era now and Altmer have magical cannons. I'd argue that's pretty advanced would you not? Although I do find it odd we never see anything like that in Sunhold or elsewhere.

I think your concern really is with the writing more than anything else. Vanus Galerion strikes people as more a cartoonish figure. Mannimarco is a Saturday-morning cartoon villain. They don't strike us as the grandiose characters we perceived them to be from the lore in previous games. Where is the gravitas you would expect from Vanus or even Mannimarco? I recognize that they both would have a degree of hubris, extreme competency, etc but something just falls flat with these two and it is disappointing. The Psijics on the other hand are among the greatest of Altmer that exist and in many ways their 'religion' if you can call it that would be heretical to the modern Altmer way of thinking. There is much in common between the Psijic endeavor and what Sotha/Vivec are doing (and I suspect the contact is partly why these two borrow and use that knowledge). Even with this knowledge I would have liked a little more gravitas from Iachesis, who SHOULD very well be the most powerful mage alive during the events of ESO. Vanus Galerion is clearly powerful and Iachesis is his far more experienced teacher. I realize they are facing powerful foes but there is something off about their treatment in the online version.

I personally have no problem with the architecture although I wouldn't have minded something a little more alien and strange. The elves are supposed to be alien and strange. The Sapiarch college though does seem to be something well advanced above any else in Tamriel. I highly doubt House Telvanni has something on par. The Elder Council might have some mighty and powerful mages, granted, but that is because Imperials are organizational machines in the series. The Sapiarchs have taken magical understanding to a level no one else does and I do believe they did a good job conveying that as part of the culture more or less.

SilverWF

Khajiit

psychotrip

dodgehopper_ESO wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

scipionumatia wrote: »

Their education systems are supposed to be the best there is, granted there is not an elder scrolls game where you get to enroll in an altmer university so we dont know much of what they would study. I can say though that literacy is common in the elder scrolls universe, even for those who dont have any kind of formal education so i wouldnt use that as a gold standard. Also its very common for present civilizations to occupy and utilize items from the deceased technologically superior predecessors. Its a running theme you can find in every elder scrolls game. The altmer utilize the aldmer tech the same way the dwemer utilize chimer and dwarven tech.
I think my main point is still valid- The altmer are very organized and operate to bolster their race, they seek knowledge and education. The dunmer are organized among their inner circles and compete against everyone who is considered an outsider, including rival dunmer organizations. They seek power. Not one is superior to the other unless you take into consideration the cultural target theyre trying to achieve. The altmer as a race have a relative common goal, while the dunmer are continuously fighting among themselves to determine what that goal should be.
Also i thought we were just comparing altmer to dunmer, not altmer vs everyone. If we are taking all races into account for which is the most superior id have to say the imperials take the cake.

All this talk of the dunmers wants me to make one, in all the elder scrolls games ive ever played ive not once made a dunmer character. Ive made altmers but that was cause the racial passive was the most flexible for damage. with dunmer your kinda pointed in the fire direction and whenever i make a mag dk i end up going argonian. I played skyrim through as an bosmer the first time, and an orc the second time. morrowind i played through as a breton. and in eso ive never made one, i really should, just dont know what class to make, mag dk seems the only fitting one tbh. maybe magblade.

So the thing you claim makes the altmer advanced is something we never get to see or interact with...that’s pretty typical of the elder scrolls at this point I guess.

Yes races can live off their past, but the Altmer seem to have nothing of their own, not even mass-producable recreations or refinements of ancient technology. They’re just medieval europeans while the dunmer have modern engineering and magical cloning. Even the nords had ruins with mechanized parts thousands of years ago.

In their attempt to make the altmer feel “grounded”, Zenimax made them more primitive than half of Tamriel.

You say they're "just medieval europeans" like building cathedrals isn't an amazing feat of engineering.

The Altmer have entire cities built like that. Flying buttresses and all. Oh, and they've got sewer systems too, we get to see Shimmerene's. We're not talking Breton cities with a few stone buildings like the castle and the guilds while everyone else just builds inside the city walls and a glorified cave system for a sewer like Wayrest. We're talking whole cities, planned out to make full use of vertical space, and beautiful in the style of Mont St. Michel or Neuschwanstein. Mournhold and Vivec's sewer might power fountains, but Shimmerene's is no slouch in the "hey, people live down here and its not completely filthy" department.

The Altmer can produce large panes of clear glass, as we see in their greenhouses. Its not modern glass, sure, but its pretty hard to make uniform clear panes of glass to the extent the Altmer do.This also indicates a rather high degree of agricultural knowledge since they use greenhouses. The Dunmer focus on fungi, obviously, since Vvardenfell's got a lot of that. The Altmer don't have anything as showy as mushroom houses, but frankly, they've got a very tolerable climate and enough stoneworkers to build awesome cities, so why would they bother?

From what we can tell of their schooling, they use magic more intensively and school more of their populaiton than we've seen previously. As far as I can tell, the Dunmer seem to work on a master/apprentice system where you get a mentor for a task from your house and you learn from that person. At least, that's how outlanders like our Nerevarine get taught how to do things. The Altmer seem to emphasize self-learning (the path to Alaxon as you seek perfection in your vocation), mentorship (highly competitive with artists and the actors in the House of Revelries) and academies like Illumination Academy and the College of Sapiarchs. Illumination Academy has an extremely magical library that betters anything we've seen in the Arcane University, College of Winterhold, or a Telvanni Magelord. The College of Sapiarchs, while we don't see a whole lot of their work, does carry out experiments (I don't recall exactly, but I want to say the Sapiarchs are montioring the crab eggs of the Queen of the Reef WB to figure out corruption levels, or something like that), and they work together as colleagues in their different disciplines. Did I mention they work together? That's huge, because the Telvanni Magelords don't and the other magical colleges tend to squabble over politics. The Telvanni are hugely competitive as well, but since they tend towards klingon promotions and dog-eat-dog, the Telvanni Magelords end up being the stand-out-above-the-rest-outliers like Neloth and Divayth Fyr. Whereas the Sapiarchs as a whole have a much greater body of knowledge and successfully protected the Crystal Tower and Summerset from the Sea Sloads for over 300 years (They weren't expecting

Ritemaster Iachesis to be mind magicked into stealing the heart of their defenses, or to be attacked by Leythen's daedra, or for Nocturnal to show up and slaughter most of them in the Crystal Tower at the time.

)

Though if you are going to bring up Divayth Fyr's magical cloning, I'm going to bring up Mannimarco pioneering necromancy and inventing lichhood. I'm hard pressed to find a Dunmer who made as big an impact on Tamriel as a whole as Vanus Galerion did by starting his mages guild to bring magic and magical education to the masses of Tamriel. Vivec isn't the only person who can plan a city. Mournhold and Vivec, meet Shimmerene and Alinor. Different cities, to be sure, but all planned out and built as excellent examples of their architectural styles (and the Altmer built theirs without infusions of divine blessings from Vivec).

Personally, I don't think the Altmer feel primitive. They feel - less than they could have been, thanks to ZOS - like very high end medieval fantasy. To use a Lord of the Rings analogy, they feel like Gondor or the Numenorians, with shades of Rivendell. Which is a little disappointing, since I think many of us were hoping for something closer to the experience we had in TES III where we were immersed in an alien, utterly weird culture, only this time with more magic.

Now, I will be blunt. If you are determined to say that the Dunmer are better, I'm not going to convince you. Its a little hard to do that when you've got all of the rich detail of TES III to argue from on top of ESO, and I've got 1 zone and 1 Chapter and devs who want to retcon half the existing lore. But please, don't overlook the accomplishments the Altmer actually do have or pretend that they are somehow more 'primitive" than what we've seen from the other races in Tamriel.

I'm not being biased toward the dunmer if that's what you think. The Altmer were my favorite race by far until very recently.

I'm not going to pretend cathedrals aren't impressive, but compared to Vivec alone it doesn't quite compare. I mean, we already went over the need for ventilation and the complex irrigation that would require either advanced magic or engineering, but just the shape of the cantons alone feels more impressive than stacking a bunch of blocks on top of each other. The same goes for redoran architecture. Those kinds of organic shapes are very difficult to make without modern tools and methods, or some sort of moldable material. Again, I understand how impressive medieval stonemasonry is, but I'm comparing it to other things we've seen in Tamriel.

I get what you're saying though. I probably am disparaging the altmer a little too much. It's just sad that, on one hand we get "primitive" tribes who can build gigantic structures with mechanized components, another race of elves who build sewer systems with modern pipes, and can build cities out of magic and mushrooms, and on the other hand we get the Altmer, who live in medieval Europe.

For some reason, Zenimax decided to make the Altmer, of all people, more "grounded" and "realistic" (their words). These guys are supposed to be the most "elven" of elves, and yet everything they do and build seems so weirdly human and out of step with the other elven races.

It's just a bit disappointing, and makes the Altmer feel less...unique I guess. I wasn't asking for them to be 100% superior to every other race in every other way. But in terms of magic and science? I thought that was literally their whole thing. I just don't know what there really is to distinguish them anymore. The one thing that supposedly justified their arrogance doesn't really seem to be there. If it is there, then as you noted, we don't really get to see it or explore much of it. It just leaves me unsatisfied.

The Redorans are using insect shells as the basis for their houses, so I'm a little less impressed with their architecture.

The cantons look cool, but as we saw in the Morrowind Chapter, Vivec is liberally handing out his (stolen) divine essence to get them built from brick, wood, and adobe. Talk about an unfair advantage. Same thing for Clockwork City, where not only does Sotha Sil have the advantage of having known and fought the Dwemer, he's got more stolen energy to work with. The dude's a genius, to be sure, but he wasn't building that stuff for Nerevar before he got his paws on the tools of Kagrenac which were made by the Deemed in the first place, you know?

In contrast, the Altmer seem to have a preference for vertical cities with a lot of towers, with absolutely beautiful gothic style buildings which are pretty incredible feats of engineering even for a single building much less a whole city. And they don't have a ready source of divine energy like the heart of Lorkhan to tap into when they build, and unlike the Tribunal, they work with Crystal Tower's energy on their own with needing intermediary tools created by another race.

I too wish ZOS had given the Altmer more in terms of magic and science. I do think that the more exotic environments of the Dunmer makes it easier to overlook the accomplishments of the Altmer in their own, much more hospitable environment.

The Redoran don't use insect shells for their houses. Unless it's the giant emperor crab of Ald-Ruhn (Or unless this is a retcon I don't know about). Their homes are inspired by insects and organic shapes. So yeah, pretty impressive to use stone / concrete / or whatever inorganic material they're using to make buildings like that.

I'm not sure how I feel about ignoring the Tribunal when it comes to Dunmer achievements and accomplishments, but I'll bite for now. Divine help or not, Vivec city can't happen without a complex ventilation system and irrigation system. I'm not an expert on this stuff, but being able to pump water upward to the top of a neighborhood-sized pyramid is no joke.

But yeah, if we're going to ignore the Tribunal entirely, then we may as well ignore all the Aldmer stuff the Altmer use, like the Crystal Tower.

And I took a look at the sewers in Shimmerene. Old Mournhold is centuries ahead of it easily. Again, modern-ish pipes that don't even leak after thousands of years (albeit with maintainance) vs. a half ruined, flooding, underground canal.

IIRC, Old Mournhold had lots of sections that were no better than caves. I seem to remember hopping around a bunch of broken pipes when I went to go kill the Dark Brotherhood folks down there, but its been a while since I played the Tribunal DLC. The Dunmer also had the example of the Dwemer when it came to making metal pipes, so I'm not terribly surprised that the Dunmer are more advanced in that regard. You don't stay neighbors with a steam-using race without learning something about how water power works. Unlike the Altmer, who are neighbors with a warlike sea faring race and so the Altmer have the best navy in Tamriel (we've already discussed the superiority of the Altmer navy over the Pact and Covenant in another thread, I believe).

I'm ignoring the Tribunal, because they weren't all that impressive before they used the Tools of Kagrenac to steal their divine powers compared to what they did afterwards. They needed the tools made by the dwemer to manipulate the divine energy of the heart of Lorkhan which they've stolen and used for their purposes.

The Altmer, even if they use the Aldmer Crystal Tower, can at least manage to use it with their own skill. The defenses of Summerset were set up by the Altmer, not the Aldmer.

This does seem to be coming down to personal preference. You see the complexities of the organic shapes in Dunmer architecture and I see the engineering feats of constructing cathedrals on a city-wide scale.

I strongly suspect that most of this comes down to two societies facing different pressures. The Redorans don't use insect shell shapes because they look amazing - they use them because the large insects of Morrowind had shells shaped to help them deal with ash storms Which is needed in Redoran territory. Vivec's cantons don't have an amazing sewer system because the Dunmer are the best at sewers, its because the Dunmer had to make a great sewer system or else their capital was going to be a public health disaster.

Likewise, the Altmer have soaring cities because they have a mountainous island where space is at a premium, so they've learned to build vertically. They face constant attacks from sea so they have to have a good navy in order to survive. They have a fairly temperate climate, so they can excel at agriculture. The Sapiarchs work together, so you don't need to see extreme outliers, whereas the Psijic Order's emphasis on individual research produces more outliers like Mannimarco and Vanus Galerion.

Each society developed differently, and adapted to the different pressures of their environment. Vvardenfell is a more exotic environment, and so the Dunmer have correspondingly exotic adaptions. Summerset is a more familiar, classically fantastical environment, and so the adaptions are more classically fantastical, though no less impressive.

The sewers of old Mournhold were relatively well maintained. They did have entrances to caves that led to the old city however.

Vivec's cantons don't have an amazing sewer system because the Dunmer are the best at sewers, its because the Dunmer had to make a great sewer system or else their capital was going to be a public health disaster.

This is a distinction without a difference. Most innovation comes from adversity. By this logic, most of the most important inventions in human history don't count because they were made to respond to people's needs. I'm not asking which race was forced to be more advanced and which wasn't. I'm not asking who had it easier. I'm asking which society is more magically / technologically advanced. I'm comparing borderline modern feats of engineering with flying buttresses.

I'm ignoring the Tribunal, because they weren't all that impressive before they used the Tools of Kagrenac to steal their divine powers compared to what they did afterwards. They needed the tools made by the dwemer to manipulate the divine energy of the heart of Lorkhan which they've stolen and used for their purposes.

The Altmer, even if they use the Aldmer Crystal Tower, can at least manage to use it with their own skill. The defenses of Summerset were set up by the Altmer, not the Aldmer.

The Tribunal took something someone else made first, and then used it in a way no one else had. It sounds like you're describing the same thing with the Altmer and their Aldmer technology. So again, either both should count or neither. Either way, tell me more about these defenses, since I don't know much about them.

This does seem to be coming down to personal preference. You see the complexities of the organic shapes in Dunmer architecture and I see the engineering feats of constructing cathedrals on a city-wide scale.

You're leaving out the fact that these organic shapes are also being used on a city-wide scale, and are sometimes also gigantic. You're also leaving out the advanced technology required for people to even be able to live inside such structures.

So on one hand you have giant cathedrals on a city-wide scale. Okay yeah that's pretty cool in a vacuum. Then you have organically shaped, town-sized buildings with suitable ventilation systems and modern irrigation...also giant and also on a city-wide scale.

Someone in another thread brought up a good point about other races as well:

The Redguards have firearms and cannons. They have stone/sand mages and healers. The Redguards make the best ships. The Nedes knew enough to connect/control the constellations. Then there was of course Shalidor.

And here its laid bare. This is why I think Zenimax dropped the ball on the Altmer. So many other races and cultures are allowed to be magical and creative and advanced in your own way, but the most intelligent race on Tamriel has to be "grounded".

At the end of the day, Altmer seem to fade into the background while others surpass them with less effort.

(Also just as a side note i'm not actually sure redguards have cannons. I'm trying to find a source for that now. I think the other stuff is still valid though).

I can't answer whether the Redguards have Cannons in this era. It is a bit early in the series because they decided to make a prequel. We do know that the Altmer in this era have a few Culanda-stone based magical cannons though. I am pretty sure I'm correct in stating that the Redguards do have cannons but that may very well be just a 'Redguard' thing. Even if that is the case it would be very early in the series and part of the Second Era if I recall correctly. We're in the Second Era now and Altmer have magical cannons. I'd argue that's pretty advanced would you not? Although I do find it odd we never see anything like that in Sunhold or elsewhere.

I think your concern really is with the writing more than anything else. Vanus Galerion strikes people as more a cartoonish figure. Mannimarco is a Saturday-morning cartoon villain. They don't strike us as the grandiose characters we perceived them to be from the lore in previous games. Where is the gravitas you would expect from Vanus or even Mannimarco? I recognize that they both would have a degree of hubris, extreme competency, etc but something just falls flat with these two and it is disappointing. The Psijics on the other hand are among the greatest of Altmer that exist and in many ways their 'religion' if you can call it that would be heretical to the modern Altmer way of thinking. There is much in common between the Psijic endeavor and what Sotha/Vivec are doing (and I suspect the contact is partly why these two borrow and use that knowledge). Even with this knowledge I would have liked a little more gravitas from Iachesis, who SHOULD very well be the most powerful mage alive during the events of ESO. Vanus Galerion is clearly powerful and Iachesis is his far more experienced teacher. I realize they are facing powerful foes but there is something off about their treatment in the online version.

I personally have no problem with the architecture although I wouldn't have minded something a little more alien and strange. The elves are supposed to be alien and strange. The Sapiarch college though does seem to be something well advanced above any else in Tamriel. I highly doubt House Telvanni has something on par. The Elder Council might have some mighty and powerful mages, granted, but that is because Imperials are organizational machines in the series. The Sapiarchs have taken magical understanding to a level no one else does and I do believe they did a good job conveying that as part of the culture more or less.

What makes you think the Sapiarchs are beyond the Telvanni? Not trying to argue, I'm just genuinely curious.

scipionumatia

Wait the redguards have guns?
WTB hundings rifle infused pls

VaranisArano

scipionumatia wrote: »

Wait the redguards have guns?
WTB hundings rifle infused pls

Well, you'd need a different game...

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/9118/

scipionumatia

seriously screw necromany i want a gun weapon skill tree. thats amazing.
Also why dont we have spears yet? or 1h magic weapons?

VaranisArano

scipionumatia wrote: »

seriously screw necromany i want a gun weapon skill tree. thats amazing.
Also why dont we have spears yet? or 1h magic weapons?

I know, right? That elf from the cinematic and Summerset trailers keeps taunting us with her One Hand and Rune skill line.

And blast it, I want my Morrowind spears!

scipionumatia

dont forget the redguard ice warden from morrowind trailer


also when we gonna get #stamwhip tho?

Enkil

Dunmer are superior in every category imaginable except for acting superior where Altmer seem to have the upper hand.

Seriously though, Morrowind RPG gave us a far better window into the Dunmer. The quality of work and backstory the Bethesda devs put into the single play games shines a million times brighter than the smaller effort the Zenimax$ mmo devs would put into one province added in a single chapter. Also, civilizations wax, wane, endure dark ages, and experience golden ages—as I’m sure has happened with both. Bethesda has done a great job showing a very diverse Dunmer society with capitalists, militarists, isolationists, slavers, “backwater” Ashlanders, and wannabe gods. We would need a proper Bethesda made RPG to provide a similar window into Altmer before a fair comparison can be made.

Tucker3711

TRICK Question IT IS THE NORDS! Their Mead is proof of their genius!

Grayfax

Just take a look more deeply into the Crystal Tower. It exists across all the planes and acts as a gateway to all realities. Pretty impressive. It is said there are greater advancements in the Arcane University, but there is much shrouded from outside eyes. This doesn't mean the Altmer treat outsiders kindly. But the "advancement" is certainly there.